Renegade
by Peptuck
Summary: The year: 2183. An attack on the Global Defense Initiative colony of Eden Prime threatens to ignite war between GDI and the Citadel, and only one woman can keep the peace, track down the attackers, and expose the true threat to the galaxy. Alt.Universe
1. Chapter 1: Gateway

_**Renegade: A Mass Effect/Command and Conquer Crossover**_

_**Chapter One: Gateway**_

The evening sky overhead was streaked with smoke and flame, and lit up by mass accelerator and missile fire. Rivers of illuminated ammunition – tracers and modified rounds – cut through the sky. In the distance, she could hear the crack, roar, and thunder of artillery fire, both missile and shell.

Smoke billowed from the half-dozen gaping wounds in the house-sized tank she crouched upon. The heat and fire boiling from the death-wounds masked her from thermal sensors, and the element zero core of the monster hid her from eezo scanners. She clutched her Werewolf rifle close to her chest, trying to keep her breathing under control. Rounds skipped off the tank's bulk, but the fire was suppressive, not directed. The batarians didn't know how many Marines were down the street, and were reluctant to advance.

That was good news for First Lieutenant Shepard. After all, it was just her now.

She peered down the street, and the clusters of microcamera nodes on the helmet displayed a high-resolution wraparound image to her. The helmet's flat, angular, metallic surface belied the detail and clarity she could see, but that detail and clarity simply told her how outmatched she was. Shepard could count dozens of enemy element zero cores and power sources out there as they massed for an attack. They were preparing for the charge that would let them bypass the last defensive wall and overrun Elysium.

The perimeter security walls had been breached in the initial assault, when the batarian pirate fleet had bombarded the city's automated defense towers from orbit. A company-strength force of men and women, totaling at about one hundred and sixty Marines and militia supported by several tanks (including the beast she was crouched upon now), had attempted to secure the streets leading to the breach. For their efforts, they'd been wiped out in a drawn-out artillery barrage from ground and orbital weapons. They'd given their lives at a high cost, but the batarians had pounded the defense to tatters, and now were sending in their infantry to secure the approach.

Shepard peered over the tank's turret, and saw both of the deformed cannons extending from the massive vehicle's turret. The top of the tank had been gutted by overhead fire from the artillery, and the crew inside had burned alive as they'd fought to keep the tank operational. Debris choked the avenue, ruined vehicles and piled chunks of building cutting off access routes for ground vehicles, but providing perfect cover for an infantry advance.

More mass accelerator rounds began to hammer the tank. A rocket-grenade exploded on the far side, followed by a couple of glowing pulses of energy – anti-personnel shots from enemy shotguns and their attached particle grenade launchers. The volume of fire continued to grow, and Shepard knew they'd either spotted her, or guessed she might use the tank as a good firing position. She couldn't stay put, and dropped down beside the tank, crouching and keeping out of the line of fire.

A burst of rounds stitched pockmarks across the tank's flank, cutting a swath across the swooping golden eagle emblem painted on the massive vehicle's track guards. Shepard looked up at the destroyed Mammoth Tank – one of the most potent and symbolic tools of the Global Defense Initiative's arsenal. She looked away from the emblem, and could see some of the enemy contacts drawing closer as the batarian infantry pushed down the street.

Shepard dashed to the nearest safe cover, which was in the inner security wall of this section of the city. It had been locked down when the batarian slavers had arrived in orbit, and most of the population of the city had withdrawn inside the security walls' protection. The breach was the entire reason the aliens were pushing so hard at this point in the city's defenses. Now, the gaping, ten-meter-wide wound in the wall was the only place Shepard could take cover without risking being flanked.

The gray-brown armor she wore concealed her from visual tracking, but that didn't hide her suit's element zero core. True enough, incoming fire picked up, slashing down the street toward her as she ran. Shepard gritted her teeth and ducked low, duck-walking behind wrecked cars and through orbitally-blasted craters. Her shields flashed, bullets flattening against the mass effect fields her suit threw up to deflect incoming rounds.

A rocket-grenade detonated a few meters away. Mass accelerator rounds smashed into the debris on all sides, while armor-piercing rounds lanced straight through the concrete and thin metal of destroyed vehicles. Shepard saw the breach in the security wall thirty meters away, but running there on foot meant it might as well have been a kilometer, with the incoming fire she was facing. Instead, she activated the flat, briefcase-sized backpack mounted on the rear of her armor. Light flared at the rear of the backpack as the mass effect field lightened her body and let the miniature thrusters on the jump pack propel her into the air. Shepard fed power to the jump pack, and it launched her up off the shattered street and toward the breach far faster than her legs could have carried her.

A storm of fire flew toward Shepard as she jetted across the thirty meters to safety, but the jetpack's boost gave her the speed she needed to get to safety. Her suit's shields flared as rounds skipped off it regardless, and the helmet beeped insistently to warn her that the shield battery was being rapidly depleted.

The ground rushed up toward Shepard, and she swung her feet in front of her body. The mass effect field intensified, further reducing her mass for a valuable heartbeat, while the thrusters cut out. She hit the ground inside the breach and dropped behind cover, disengaging the field and returning to normal mass as she spun toward the direction the batarians were approaching.

Her heart slammed up into her throat as her sensors displayed the number of enemy contacts. There were more than a hundred enemy troops incoming, advancing up the street by fireteams. Far, far too many for her to take on, and if they turned their artillery against her, she wouldn't last a heartbeat.

If the enemy breached this position, though, they would flood through the gap, and with the local garrison fighting on the other points at the perimeter, the civilians of Elysium would be helpless against the slavers.

_Mindoir. Akuze._

The memories of those moments lanced into her brain, setting her thoughts ablaze with hate and fury. Killers in hardsuits looming like giants, murdering her family and dragging her neighbors off as slaves. Monsters of gemstone and darkness sweeping over a colony, wiping out the garrison with lightning and white fire.

_Never again._

She rose, shouldered the rifle, and engaged the Werewolf's SAW module. As the barrel slid out and extended, she stilled herself, and sighted her first target. So long as she still breathed, Elysium would not become another Mindoir, or another Akuze.

* * *

_Agony._

Pain rolled through Shepard's temples, and she hissed as she fought to open her eyes. Sensations came to her dimly, distant and unclear. She recognized she was lying on her back, and the pliable, soft-yet-uncomfortable nature of the cushion she laid on told her it was an infirmary bed (not hospital, _infirmary_). She could hear the quiet hum of working machinery, along with the vibrations that only came from a vessel in motion – tinged with that unique timbre associated with mass effect drives that a biotic was attuned to. Air brushed over her bare skin, telling her that he'd been stripped down to her underwear.

_And no one tucked me in_, she thought. Bad idea; it hurt to try to smile.

The room was dark. Not to the point where she couldn't see, but she had to focus for a moment before she could make anything out. The light was dim, with a faint reddish tint to it. Shepard closed her eyes, taking inventory of the pains across her body to figure out where she'd been hurt the worst, and concluded that was "everywhere."

Next, she tried to remember what had happened before she'd passed out. Memories flickered up, flashes of pain and violence, and the last moments solidified.

_Another surge of batarian soldiers attempting to rush her position, the third that hour, ignoring the pile of their dead fellows she'd left. They scrambled under covering fire, weapons barking, and she gunned them down one by one. They moved not like pirates, but like trained military. Hegemony-trained military._

_One had gotten close, and as the alien had reached her, Shepard's body had surged with electricity and swirling dark energy, and she'd temporarily rewritten the laws of physics. The nodes of element zero in her body had interacted with the implant at the base of her neck, was boosted by the circuitry in her armor, and Shepard sent a pulse of explosive gravity into the alien's chest and head. It snapped back grotesquely and went flying away._

_The world turned white as something boiled the street only a few meters away, and then there was pain and heat and light._

Shepard opened her eyes again, and glanced around the room. It looked like an infirmary, a standard shipboard facility, consisting of a long room with beds lining one bulkhead, each of them partially recessed into the wall, where scanners would no doubt be able to analyze the brain and upper body more effectively. Medical machinery stood beside each of the beds, and the walls were lined with lockers and storage containers for other gear. It resembled every shipboard infirmary she'd ever had the pleasure of waking up inside, with one exception: The standard, faintly blue-gray lighting of a GDI military vessel was replaced by that rosy lighting she'd noted earlier, and what might have been a faint, blurry white mist at ankle level.

There was no one on-duty in the room, which struck her as odd, unless the ship's VI or EVA unit was watching.

It was. She heard the hissing of a sliding door, and Shepard looked up, to see a tall, limber woman walk into the room. Correction: she wasn't walking so much as prowling, her body moving with a natural grace inherent to a predator. She had pale but clear skin, long black hair that came down to the top of her chest, and a black suit that only needed to be a size smaller to count as skintight.

"Lieutenant Shepard," she said, accent tinged by what she guessed was Australian. "Good to see you're awake. We don't have much time." She had appealing features and large blue eyes, and it took Shepard a moment's concentration to not be distracted by them. There was an odd symmetry to her features. Genetic modification?

"You have me at a disadvantage," Shepard said through the pain. She shook her head, but that was a bad idea, as it brought more headaches.

"You can call me Miranda," the woman replied. "No rank, so don't worry about that."

"How bad was I hurt?" she asked, getting to most pertinent questions. She could figure out whether to open fire after a self-diagnosis was complete.

"Concussion, some lacerations, shrapnel wounds, fourteen mass accelerator rounds embedded at various points in your body, some hemorrhaging in the lungs, three broken bones, and you bit your tongue so hard you nearly choked on your own blood," Miranda rattled off. "Nothing some medigel and a couple hours in an autosurgeon couldn't fix."

"What happened down on Elysium?" Shepard asked, after that had sunk in. That was one hell of an autosurgeon. Not even GDI military-grade nanosurgical equipment could repair that kind of damage that quickly. Or at least leave her ambulatory.

"The batarians achieved breakthrough and invaded the city," Miranda replied, walking across the room toward her. She noted Miranda was armed with what looked like a submachinegun – collapsed pistol, non-GDI variant - on her hip. "We estimate they managed to make off with perhaps ten thousand civilians before we managed to intervene and drive them off."

A sinking feeling ran through Shepard as she heard her words, and it took her a moment to process the entirety of that statement. A deep, wracking pain slashed through her that had nothing to do with her injuries, along with a realization that she'd failed herself. She was still breathing, and the enemy had won.

"No, don't blame yourself," Miranda said quickly. Shepard scowled a bit as Miranda seemed to so easily read her features. "It was no fault of your own. The batarians bombed every approach into the city, and killed practically the entire GDI garrison before they breached the walls. Your position held out the longest, right up until help arrived."

"GDI?" Shepard asked, but it was rhetorical. These people weren't GDI, that much was obvious, which left only one real possibility. The Citadel wasn't allowed military access to GDI space, and had nothing close enough to transition to Elysium anyway.

"The nearest GDI relief fleet is still six hours away," Miranda said. "_We_ saved the colony instead."

Shepard closed her eyes, and nodded, understanding. But the reality of it made her head whirl.

The Global Defense Initiative had ruled humanity since the collapse of individual state governments in the early 21st century due to tiberium and the Third World War. It had stayed that way through two more world wars and the First Contact War with the Scrin. It had dominated humanity as it spread through Sol, right up through the discovery of the Prothean ruins on Mars, the development of prototype mass effect technology from said ruins, the discovery of the Charon Mass Relay, and the subsequent Shanxi War with the Turian Hierarchy and the opening of diplomatic relations with the Citadel.

Only one other organization had survived the collapse, and it had been GDI's rival and enemy through all three of those world wars. Conflict had calmed down after the Third Tiberium War had ended, but they were still out there. They were supposed to be toothless, a non-military religious organization bound under the Unified Human Armistice Treaty to possess no offensive military forces, and had stuck to that treaty for more than a century.

"_Had_" was the key word, as she put together the pieces.

"We," Shepard said, "meaning the Brotherhood of Nod."

"Clever woman," Miranda replied, giving her a ghost of a smile.

"Why would Nod care about a GDI colony?" Shepard asked, pointedly avoiding a much more pertinent and much more troubling question: where the hell had the Brotherhood of Nod gotten military warships? Nod's military had been stripped in TW3 and the UHAT treaty limited their military capability. Not even their breakaway Terminus colonies had anything larger than a light cruiser.

"We care about humanity, Shepard," Miranda replied. "GDI, Nod, Forgotten, independent, it doesn't matter. Elysium is a human world, and if GDI can't protect it, we will."

Shepard exhaled and tried to stand.

"Why'd you bring me here?" she asked.

"Because your particular talents may prove useful," Miranda replied. "We tried to save as many civilians as we could, but the batarians made off with ten thousand, and you were one of the few military survivors we found when we swept the wreckage."

"What talents?" Shepard asked, frowning.

"You're a survivor of GDI's Commando Training Program, have above-average biotic talents, and managed to hold off about five hundred batarians with a rifle and shouted profanity." Miranda asked. "Not to mention surviving Akuze-"

Shepard's eyes snapped up, and a spike of raw, boiling hatred ran through her.

Miranda stared at the Commando, not speaking for a moment, and then took a single slow step backward.

"My apologies," she said quietly. "I shouldn't have brought that up. I know the... _memory_ of Akuze can't be pleasant."

Shepard scowled and nodded. She closed her eyes and pushed back the ugly bits of history where she'd gotten her facial scars from, forcing down the images of bladed threads of silver and crashing lightning bolts. She gestured to the far wall once the memories were banished.

"We're on a ship and moving," she said, the words slow and controlled. "Since I'm not a prisoner, you need me to help kill something."

"Correct," Miranda replied. "The batarian slavers retreated as soon as we arrived at the planet and assaulted their fleet. Most of their ships were ramshackle pirate vessels anyway, not true warships. The remainder, including the transport carrying the captured civilians, went to a system about twelve hours from Elysium, at cruising distance. The pirates are staying over for drive discharge and repairs."

"GDI won't arrive in time to find them and free the slaves," Shepard said, and Miranda nodded. That ghost of a smile returned.

"_We,_ however, have recon drones watching them, and our fleet is two hours away and cruising at full speed," she said. "While we have our own marine compliment, all of whom are quite competent at their jobs, it would be better if they were led by someone with... exceptional capability in ship-to-ship boarding operations."

Shepard stared back, mind rushing as she tried to figure out the angle Nod was working at here. She knew from history that the Brotherhood excelled at secrecy and deception, and that they were treacherous at best. On the other hand, she knew from history that the Brotherhood had a humanitarian side and seemed to have honestly cared for the civilians under its rule. Though Nod was banned from having a military, the religion itself was still intact and had a strongly charitable bent throughout human space. They'd saved a lot of lives since humanity spread from Sol three decades ago.

And they were trying to rescue civilians. GDI civilians, at that.

But a Nod military capable of offensive action... That was a nightmare that GDI's leadership would go ballistic over. And any GDI personnel assisting a Nod military action could potentially be charged with aiding and abetting a hostile power, or even treason. If anyone knew what she was being asked to do...

"What if I refuse?" Shepard asked.

Miranda's response was to gesture at a datapad on a table by Shepard's bed. There was a thrumming of working dark energy, and the clipboard rose, hovered, and dropped back to the table.

She was a biotic, too.

Shepard understood the threat quite clearly. Alone, unarmed, and in her skivvies, her only weapons were her biotics. Miranda, meanwhile, was armed, on her own ship, probably had a contingent of guards at hand, and could counter Shepard's own mass effect capability.

She wasn't a prisoner, but it wouldn't take much effort to change that.

"We're on the same side, Shepard," Miranda said. "GDI or Nod, we're both human, and humans are in the hands of alien slavers. We have to stop them."

Shepard closed her eyes, mulling over it for a moment and trying to figure out what Nod's ulterior motive was.

_If there even is one,_ she reminded herself.

Instead, she remembered Mindoir. She remembered her family and friends, fighting the batarian slavers and being gunned down and burned alive for their trouble. She remembered seeing people from her home being hauled away as slaves. She remembered the four-eyed, humanoid aliens as they hunted through the ruins for survivors, and her, hiding beneath rubble and ruins, praying to not be seen while curled up in abject terror.

Shepard opened her eyes, met Miranda's, and nodded, fighting back the deep unease bubbling up inside her at the notion of working with Nod agents. Criminal actions and interstellar treaties be damned.

"Get me armor and a weapon," she muttered, voice tight with anger and determination.

She wouldn't fail them again.

* * *

They dropped out of FTL outside the system, a three-world red giant that hadn't earned anything past a numerical designation. The Nod fleet, perhaps a dozen ships of frigate tonnage with three cruisers leading them, paused only for a few minutes. Shepard stood on the bridge of the Nod vessel as the pilot conferred with their own Electronic Virtual Agent on where to go next. Miranda was with her, though she'd changed from her skin-clinging black outfit to a set of armor that made the Lieutenant imagine an insect wreathed in black metallic carapace.

"We have a recon ship inside the system," Miranda explained as they jumped to FTL. "Drone vessel with stealth systems."

"Stealth, in space?" Shepard asked, to which Miranda smiled. Stealth in space was supposed to be impossible, but history showed the Brotherhood always had technological surprises in store. It shouldn't have been a surprise that they were ahead of the curve.

"Why are you letting me up here?" Shepard asked, gesturing around the long, narrow bridge.

The ship's commander sat on an elevated command chair while senior bridge crew sat in a semicircle below and in front of him. Lower-ranking crew manned consoles on either side of the bridge running back to the elevator. An enormous holographic display showed their fleet's relative positions in the system.

"Orders," Miranda said. "We want you to see it all."

That left a deep sense of unease in Shepard's gut, and she started suspecting what the real ulterior motive to this whole endeavor was.

They came out of FTL speed a few moments later, and the batarian fleet sat in front of them, directly under their guns, with absolutely no warning of the incoming attack. The batarian fleet consisted of only three vessels, two light cruisers and a huge transport.

Shepard watched the holographic display with concern, noting the weaponry Nod was using.

Most warships carried mass accelerator cannons for their main guns, but the cruisers were using lasers for their main weapons instead of solid-slug weapons, as shown when they opened up with barrages of ruby-red light. Shepard knew that the salarians used higher-frequency lasers that gave their point defenses greater range, but most warships relied on mass accelerators for long-range firepower due to beam diffusion over distance. Even GDI's ion cannons diffused rapidly when fired in space, which was why they relied on mass accelerators for long-range fire and switched to ion cannons at medium range. But the Nod ships' spinal-mounted lasers retained coherency over a far greater range than she expected, and longer than GDI's directed ion cannons.

Warships only carried kinetic barriers, which did nothing against directed energy weapons. The Nod vessels tore through the batarians' barriers in seconds, the cruisers slagging the warships's weapons before pounding them to pieces with mass accelerator fire. The frigates, meanwhile, disabled the transport's weapons before they could start returning fire. It was a worrying show of their firepower.

"Head down to the launch bay, Lieutenant," Miranda said, and started toward the rear of the bridge. "Now the hard part begins."

Once the freighter was disabled, the assault boats launched and docked to the hull of the slavers' ship. Shepard and Miranda led separate platoons. The frigates made sure that the GARDIAN point-defense lasers on the transport vessel were completely disabled before the assault boats even launched. Instead of cutting into the hulls, Shepard noted, the Nod personnel hacked and overrode the airlocks.

The Brotherhood marines wore black armor, bereft of symbols or markings, and carried mass accelerator rifles with incendiary ammunition. She would have expected them to use laser weapons, but instead they went in with mass accelerators. It didn't take much thought to figure out why: they were hiding their presence. Laser weapons would have left distinctive marks on both the ships and the crew.

The next few minutes felt like hours, and it was among the worst tight corridor combat she'd ever engaged in. Try as she might, Shepard's subsequent memories of the boarding assault only came back as flashes of disconnected brutality, of tight combat with desperate alien troops, mass accelerators blazing and the ruby light of incendiaries slashing up and down the corridors.

She remembered pouring fire into a batarian slaver's shields until the rounds punched through his chest, shredding the alien's torso into hamburger.

She remembered hurling a grenade into a fleeing slaver, the explosive striking his armor and latching on with magnetic clamps, and the horrified cries before Shepard triggered the detonator.

She remembered looking at a mauled and deformed alien corpse as she set loose with a rippling biotic field that warped and twisted the slaver's body like clay.

She remembered pounding a batarian's face in with her biotics, remembered pinning one to the ceiling where the Nod commandos could blast it apart, remembered shoving her pistol into a dying slaver's mouth and pulling the trigger, and remembered the sizzle and welcome scent of burnt alien flesh as the Brotherhood marines blew them apart with searing fire.

Shepard thought of those images and scents and sounds, and she remembered the dominant emotion she'd felt as she killed, over and over and over again: disgust and hatred. The latter for the enemy, and the former for herself.

They finished clearing the freighter's cramped bridge, and the vessel was secured. Shepard leaned over the bridge consoles and accessed them via her omnitool, the batarian script translating automatically, and she brought up camera feeds from the slave pens. The captives were being held inside large, sealed bays, separate from the crew sections of the ship where the fighting raged. Shepard wanted to go to them, to check on the captives and tell them it was all right, but she couldn't; Miranda had been very specific on that.

Nod didn't want anyone to know who had actually saved the civilians. To that end, they activated the ship's security systems, and pumped gas into the bays that rendered the entire population unconscious; what was supposed to prevent the slaves from breaking free was instead used to conceal who their rescuers were. Nod had already risked a great deal, Miranda explained, by having their ships openly fight the slavers over a GDI colony. Verifying their existence by rescuing the colonists would alert GDI that they still had military strength.

"And what's to stop me from telling GDI?" Shepard had asked her as they stood on the bridge of the captured transport. "You're in violation of the UHAT by even having this kind of capability."

"If you report this to GDI, you would be implicated in assisting Nod military personnel," she replied, her tone cold, calm, and entirely reasonable. "That's a crime under the UHAT as well. Would you be willing to cause the kind of political instability that telling GDI about our small flotilla would invoke? Are you so sure you want to do that for the sake of an organization that would have let these colonists be taken away?"

Shepard stared back at her, arms crossed, and tried to think of a proper response.

"It doesn't matter whether they did it intentionally," Miranda said, and Shepard blinked. She'd been just about to say that very thing. "Incompetence or malice, it amounts to the same thing. If it weren't for us, these people would be in batarian mining camps within the month. Are you willing to betray us after we saved these people?"

Shepard knew Nod's history, but their actions here spoke differently. She closed her eyes and shook her head, not sure what to say or do.

"You don't need to do anything," Miranda said. "Just use the fabricated story we've given you when GDI's fleet arrives. Don't mention our fleet or our assistance. We disappear, you keep your job and are rewarded for being the hero you are, and these people get to go home. Everyone wins."

Shepard opened her eyes, stared back at Miranda's cold blue eyes, and said nothing.

Six hours later a GDI relief fleet arrived in-system, following a distress beacon. They found two destroyed batarian slave ships, and a freighter loaded with ten thousand civilians that had apparently been retaken by a single biotic Commando named Shepard. According to the story, Shepard had stowed away on the slavers' ship, seized the bridge, gassed the crew, and used the ship's weapons to launch a surprise attack on the cruisers and destroyed them, but not without being badly damaged by return fire.

It was a wild story, but two destroyed ships, a pile of batarian corpses, and ten thousand jubilant, rescued colonists were plenty of verification. Meanwhile, reports of unidentified ships intervening and attacking the batarian fleet in orbit were discounted with the surety of bureaucracy that was convinced that it was right and all evidence to the contrary was wrong.

The assault on Elysium City was considered a tragedy and a provocation, but Shepard came out of that battle a hero thanks to the Brotherhood of Nod's silent intervention, complete with a medal and ceremony and drinks and parties and all that pizzazz. It left an ugly taste in her mouth whenever someone praised her for being the Hero of Elysium, and the medal stayed in the drawer in whatever desk she sat at that week.

But at least Elysium's people had been saved.

* * *

A year after Elysium, GDI tracked the pirates who had been raiding human space back to their hub on the barren moon of Torfan, and bombed their base and everything within fifty kilometers of it into rapidly-expanding clouds of high-temperature dust. Shepard was with the fleet that destroyed the base, and watched the ion cannon bombardment of the surface with grim satisfaction. Nothing survived.

Six years passed after Torfan, and a round of promotions came and went. The Verge War with the Batarian Hegemony started in 2180 over control of the Attican Traverse and to punish the Hegemony for their support of the constant piracy. Shepard volunteered for a number of operations that earned her distinction, and she rose up through the ranks to become Lieutenant Commander Shepard. Nod's military never showed their faces again, and she never spoke with another Nod soldier. There were the occasional reports of oddly-designed warships at the fringes of GDI space, but nothing concrete, and the Nod Terminus colonies never showed any evidence of substantial militarization.

Assignments came and went, but halfway through 2183, Shepard was recalled from a patrol mission in the Verge to Earth, where she found she had been reassigned to some new secret military project.

Two days later, she was on a shuttle heading for the shipyards overlooking Earth. She stared down at the planet with mixed emotions, noting the vast, almost endless stretches of green and blue across the continental masses, with wide sections of the planet marked by the white and gray of civilized areas, scattered among the vast swathes of sickly green Tiberium zones. Huge barriers, visible from space, kept the alien crystal from devouring the chokingly-crowded human cities.

No wonder the colonies grew so quickly. Humanity's homeworld was a hellhole of xenoformed green and blue crystal. Few wanted to stay on Earth. If Tiberium wasn't so damned useful for industry and power generation, the human species might have gone extinct long ago. Most of the population in Sol lived on Luna, Mars, Jupiter, or the countless orbitals threaded between them or over the other planets in the system.

Shepard crossed the small shuttle's passenger compartment, and started looking out into the darkness of space. Up ahead, there was one of the massive, multi-kilometer-long orbital docking stations at Lagrange Point 3, and she could see numerous ships docked to it, released toward the embracing void or moving into position to attach. One in particular caught Shepard's eye.

"That ours?" asked the only other man on the shuttle, a Lieutenant Pressly. He was bald, had a squeaky voice, and had a dark goatee tinged with a bit of gray. He stood and joined the Commander at the window, peered out, and spotted the vessel Shepard was looking at: a dagger-like frigate, painted in the ubiquitous gray and gold of GDI military ships.

"That's the one. _GDS Normandy_," he replied, and Shepard nodded. It looked good. A heavy, long, rectangular shape, narrowing a bit toward the bow, with a set of thrusters on thick, long wing-struts emerging from the vessel's flanks toward the aft end. Shepard could see GARDIAN batteries on either side of the ship, the main ion cannon mounted in the bow, and the launching ports for Orca support craft in the lower bay sections, but no craft were currently mounted. The _Normandy's_ name was etched across the flanks of the frigate in large, blocky black letters.

The shuttle turned on a new heading, moving straight for the station, and the porthole turned to show the blackness of space. Against the transparent material, Shepard caught a reflection of both of them. Pressly, with his short, regulation-length mustache and beard, resplendent in his navy blue, gold-trimmed Naval uniform. And Shepard . . . .

She stared into her own face, vicious scars running across her features, reminding everyone she encountered just how she'd earned her stripes. Hard eyes, along with narrow, tight features. She'd been told a few times that she was attractive, and had received offers to get rid of the scars, but the ragged lines across her face were too important to get rid of. They reminded her of the price of survival.

"This is going to be an interesting deployment, ma'am," Pressly added, sitting down in his crash seat. Shepard nodded as she turned around and settled down as well.

"I hope you're wrong, Pressly," she replied, scratching her head. "'Interesting' tends to end up with corpses. Do you know where we're going on this run?"

"Shakedown run to Eden Prime," Pressly replied. "Shouldn't be too eventful, I'd wager."

Shepard frowned, nodded, and peered out the porthole once again, and lost herself in that memory once more.

* * *

_**Codex - Global Defense Initiative – The Verge War**_

_Following GDI's entry into the galactic stage during the 2160's, humanity fought a series of skirmishes and trade conflicts with the Batarian Hegemony, whose borders intertwined with GDI territory in the Skyllian Verge. This conflict consisted mostly of skirmishes between patrol craft and Hegemony-funded privateers raiding GDI colonies and shipping. The Hegemony made appeals toward the Citadel Council to declare the Skyllian Verge an "area of batarian interest" which would make GDI infringement on the territory an act of war, due to GDI's refusal to join the Citadel. The Council denied these appeals, stating that they had neither authority to define a foreign power's borders nor willingness to provoke a war. In protest, the Hegemony withdrew from the Council's collection of associate species and closed their embassy._

_This proxy war came to a head during the Skyllian Blitz, when an alliance of Hegemony-funded pirates attacked Elysium, a major human colony in the Verge. The attack was repelled, but not without heavy losses to the defensive garrison. Though the Council denounced the attack, they did not call the Hegemony to task for funding the offensive, either._

_A year after the Blitz, GDI retaliated against the pirates' base on Torfan, obliterating it from orbit with dreadnought-based ion cannon fire, in a display of military might that sent an unspoken message to the galaxy that GDI would not tolerate further aggression. The Hegemony refused to bow to this overt display of force, however, and continued to fund pirate raids._

_In 2180, four years after the Blitz, GDI stated that it would no longer tolerate the pirate attacks, and declared war on the Batarian Hegemony. The Hegemony petitioned for Citadel support, but the Council refused, stating that the batarians had provoked GDI into action. By 2183, the Verge War progressed with GDI forces securing three batarian colony worlds along the border and cutting pirate attacks by more then sixty percent. Despite GDI technological advantages, most notably being the ion cannons used by their dreadnoughts, human advances into Hegemony space have been limited due to heavy resistance, reduced FTL speeds, significant logistical constraints, and a sluggish civilian bureaucracy on Earth._

* * *

**_Author's Notes: _**The lunatics over at Spacebattles gave me this idea. Blame them.

If one has a sharp eye, they might note some changes. This chapter has been revised and cleaned up in some areas. I'm doing a general revision of the entire story. Not a lot of major changes; just some adjustments to prose to clean things up and correct some continuity errors, i.e. the fact that Valern was confirmed as the salarian Councilor in the third ME game.

Two additional notes:

First: This story ignores the events of Tiberium Twilight. This story assumes that the "good" ending of Tiberium Wars is canon and that Kane disappeared from Earth at the conclusion of the Third Tiberium War.

Second: If you are interested in other stories set in this universe, look up_ "Eagle's Fall"_ and _"The Verge War"_ by CharNobyl. I consider the former to be loosely canon with this setting, and the latter and definitely canon with my setting.


	2. Chapter 2: Calm

_**Chapter 2: Calm**_

_"The Arcturus Prime Relay is in range. Initiating transmission sequence."_

Joker's voice echoed over the intercom, his tone crisp and businesslike as he announced the approach to the Charon/Arcturus Prime relay.

_"We are connected. Calculating transit mass and destination."_

Lieutenant Commander Shepard walked up the stairs from the crew section and into the _Normandy's_ combat information center, set aft of the bridge and the operations corridor. A semicircle of blue-lit, outward-facing consoles ringed the CIC, with a central platform looking over the room. In the center of the CIC was a massive hologram, looming over the naval officers and crew, currently showing a sensor map of the local area, with the Charon Relay highlighted and quickly growing larger. Further out, she could see the labeled thermal emissions of no fewer than twenty gun installations. The enormous, disc-shaped ion cannon batteries were spaced around the Charon Relay, each sporting six dreadnought-grade ion cannons, three on the station's relative "top" and relative "bottom." Coupled with the stations was the Seventh Fleet, with more than eighty capital-grade warships, two _Mountain_-class dreadnoughts, and the tremendous, blocky specter of a _Glacier_-class dreadnought.

Marines saluted her as she passed, and she nodded in reply. Unlike the Navy crewmen, they wore brown and gray earth-tone armor plating, sidearms holstered at their hips and Werewolf rifles affixed to their suits' backs. Their faceplates were retracted, but the rest of the helmet framed their heads, the chin rising up enough to hide their mouths. In case of emergency they could redeploy in a heartbeat.

The Navy officers and enlisted wore their day uniforms, gray fatigues with blue trim under a lighter hardsuit, the kind that could fast-seal in case of vacuum exposure. They didn't wear helmets, but carried emergency breathmasks on their belts and the emergency vacuum lockers were labeled and within easy reach. If the compartment was breached they'd survive, assuming this entire section of the ship didn't get hurled into vacuum, which was a distressing probability when frigates went up against larger ships.

_"Relay is hot. Acquiring approach vector."_

The entire room was suffused with the cool blue lighting, and the gray-blue color-scheme that permeated all GDI military structures made the interior of the _Normandy_ a well-lit vessel. Shepard still found herself comparing the interior of a GDI ship to the dimly-lit Nod vessel she'd ridden years ago.

Shepard nodded as she passed Pressly, who returned the nod before going back to work at his navigation station. The rest of the crew was on edge, intently monitoring the blue-tinted holographic screens as the Normandy attempted its first mass relay jump. Shepard strode past them and headed up the crew corridor connecting the CIC to the bridge.

_"All stations, secure for transit."_

On either side of the crew corridor were chairs set before large holographic monitors, with crew members working on heat management, drive core discharge status, stealth systems, power control, damage control, weapons, and other shipboard operations. Like the CIC crew, the enlisted personnel manning these stations were keeping an eye on every system of the ship in case something went wrong. They weren't just going on a shakedown run, they were testing an entire ship loaded with cutting-edge technology of both Citadel and human design, which meant anything could go wrong, and if it did, they were in deep trouble.

_"Board is green. Approach run has begun."_

There was a faint vibration in the deck of the ship as Joker rearranged the Normandy's quartet of engines, tightening them together for maximum forward acceleration. They were getting close to the Arcturus Prime Relay now. Shepard knew the ship's EVA would be engaging in the standard handshake protocol with the defense fleet around the Relay, syncing with the communications and security EVA on the _Jupiter_-class carrier _Zeus_.

Shepard passed through the crew corridor and stepped into the small bridge, and peered out the forward windows. The portholes were the only concession the Initiative's engineers had made to the old romantic notion of windows in space ships, and out in the black vista of space, Shepard saw the Relay gleaming against the stellar backdrop.

_"Hitting the relay in three . . . ."_

It was enormous, a two kilometer-long double-pronged dagger sitting in the blackness, orbiting Pluto where the ice moon of Charon had once been. At the rear of the mass relay, Shepard could see a glittering blue conflagration, a pair of rapidly spinning rings encircling a miniature sun of electric blue light. Gleaming with the light of the element zero reaction at its core, the mass relay seemed like an inhabited space station, lights blinking on and off along its length.

_"Two . . . ._

As they approached the artifact, the light became so intense that the bridge windows darkened to complete opacity to blot out the brightness. A faint shudder went through the ship as the relay detected their approach, and an arc of energy lanced out of the relay's core, engulfing the vessel. Lightning sparked off the _Normandy's_ kinetic barriers, flickering and jumping wildly as it drew closer to the artifact.

_"One . . . ."_

There was a surge of energy and an intense shudder ran through the entirety of the _GDS Normandy_ while it passed into the zero-mass corridor of the Relay. Blue light flashed around them, and the stars changed to constellations only visible from a star thirty-six light years away from Sol.

Shepard looked around the bridge, and then back up the crew corridor, making sure everything was still secure. She saw crewmembers visibly relaxing, their features pale and corpselike in the blue glow from their monitors.

Well, they hadn't all died horribly. That was a good start.

"Thrusters, check," reported the slight, bearded man sitting in the pilot's chair at the center of the bridge. He was bathed in light from a dozen holographic monitors, his hands flicking through a complex weave of symbols arrayed around his waist. The blue light of the displays gave his skin a pale, near-deathly pallor.

"Navigation, check," Flight Officer Jeff "Joker" Moreau reported, his tone still serious and businesslike. "Internal emissions sink engaged. All systems online." He paused. "Drift . . . just under fifteen hundred K."

"Fifteen hundred is good," came a sharp, metallic voice from beside Shepard. Looming on the other side of the bridge was a tall, slender form, vaguely resembling an avian in his lean, lanky shape. He was clad in dark crimson armor, and his slender, bony face was a mask of cartilage painted with blood-red and bone-white tribal lines. A pair of thin, vertically-oriented mandibles framed a mouth with short, sharp predator's teeth, and glittering green eyes were nestled inside the turian's mask-like face.

"Your captain will be pleased," Nihlus Kryik said, and then turned to leave, giving Shepard a quick glance and a nod. There was silence on the bridge for several long seconds, until the turian Spectre was out of earshot, before anyone spoke.

"I hate that guy," Joker muttered, all pretensions of professionalism flying out the airlock as he slouched in his pilot's chair.

In the copilot's seat on the starboard side of the bridge, Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko frowned and glanced Joker's way. Blue light reflected off the glassy crystals growing from his jawline.

"Nihlus just gave you a compliment," he said, his tone level. "So . . . you hate him."

"Look," Joker said, quick and annoyed, "You remember to zip up your jumpsuit on the way out of the bathroom, that's good. I just shot us halfway across the galaxy and hit a target the size of a pinhead, so that's incredible!" He grunted. "Besides. _Citadel Spectre_, lieutenant. Call me paranoid, but I don't trust alien ninja commandos on a GDI ship."

"You're paranoid," Kaidan muttered. "The Council helped fund this project, they have a right to send someone to keep an eye on their investment. Especially when it's a GDI-controlled ship."

"Yeah," Joker replied. "A turian Spectre on a _GDI ship_. They could have sent anyone to observe, but they sent a turian ninja secret agent to watch over us. Like hell this is standard procedure in Citadel space."

Shepard looked over the two men. Flight Officer Jeff Moreau was a thin man with a thick, close-cropped beard, and he wore the standard-issue flight officer's cap like it was a fashion statement instead of part of his uniform. His hands danced across the controls absently as he spoke, keeping the Normandy flying on course with casual ease.

Kaidan Alenko was Joker's opposite. Where Joker was slender and bearded, Kaidan was muscular and clean-shaven. His hair rose up into a rounded peak over his forehead, and Shepard suspected he didn't care about others' opinions on his hairstyle. Whereas Joker was talkative, irritable, and excitable, Alenko was calm and controlled, with a sense of holding back a powerful, terrifying strength.

It might have had something to do with being a biotic; military biotics tended to be focused and tightly controlled emotionally, as a byproduct of their training. Shepard could see the implant on the back of his neck, an older, slightly bulkier L2 model. It was located next to a small, flat nub of glassy green poking out the base of his skull, shaved flat enough that it didn't interfere with his head movements. That crystal matched the line of similar flat green nubs that grew out of Alenko's right jaw, running down from the base of his jawbone to his chin.

Kaidan Alenko was a rarity: a biotic who was also a tiberium mutant.

On most people, tiberium growing out of the skin was a sign of near-fatal infestation. However, the kind that developed in most mutants was an "inert" variant, similar to the tiberium that had made up the alien Scrin. Somehow, it made them immune to tiberium infestation, and had other biological effects, such as increased musculature and enhanced senses. Shepard didn't know Kaidan's story, but she knew it had to be an interesting one; GDI paid good money for mutant soldiers, and mutant biotics were both in extreme demand and of very limited supply.

"They don't send Spectres on shakedown runs," Shepard commented, cutting in on Joker's bitching session. The pilot nodded.

"I'm telling you, there's more going on here than-"

"_Joker," _came a voice over the intercom. Shepard straightened reflexively; it was the voice of Captain David Anderson. _"Status report."_

"Just cleared the mass relay, Captain," Joker replied quickly, professionalism springing back into his voice. "Stealth systems engaged, everything looks solid."

"_Good," _Anderson said. _"Find us a comm buoy and link us into the network. I want mission reports relayed back to the _Philadelphia_ brass before we reach Eden Prime."_

"Aye-aye, Captain," Joker replied. "Better brace yourself, sir. I think Nihlus is headed your way."

"_He's _already_ here, Lieutenant," _Anderson replied, a frown audible in his tone. Joker cringed and shook his head. Beside him, Kaidan mouthed an "oops."_"Tell Commander Shepard to meet me in the comm room for a briefing."_

"I'm on my way," Shepard said quickly, and started back down the crew corridor.

"Is it just me," Joker muttered, "Or does the Captain always seem a little pissed off?"

"Only when he's talking to you," Kaidan replied.

Shepard barely heard that last part as she hurried down the crew corridor as fast as she could without actually breaking into a run. The strange circumstances were putting her on edge, but she suspected that Anderson was about to tell her why they were catering a foreign military agent on _Normandy's_ first run. Not to mention that during normal operational briefings captains would call all the department heads together, but if it was just Shepard, the captain, and Nihlus . . . .

The Normandy was a co-engineered vessel: Citadel FTL and mass effect systems married together with human-derived stealth technology and ion weaponry, a peace offering between the Initiative and the Citadel after decades of lukewarm relations since the Shanxi War. The first war between a Citadel species and the Initiative had taught them both a lot; for example, the Initiative had learned that orbital ion cannon emplacements could be taken out by mass accelerators with good math behind them, and the Hierarchy had learned that house-sized tanks were _not_ as ridiculous an idea as previously thought.

Turian-human relations were still bad decades later. GDI was still leery over alien influence, as Shanxi was the second time they'd had to repel what appeared to be an unprovoked alien attack on humanity. The turians were angry that the war had ended with a bloody human victory, at least in the short term, as the Council had brokered a peace deal after the initial turian invasion had been repelled. The Normandy project was an ice-breaker intended to convince the turians' Primarchs and the more conservative members of GDI's Director's Board that they could work together peacefully, and it had worked, so far.

But there was more about this deployment that was bothering her. Joker was right, however paranoid he seemed; wouldn't this shakedown be better observed by technical specialists? A turian or salarian technical team would have made more sense than a Spectre commando. And the size of the crew compliment was troubling too, for a shakedown. There was no need for fully equipped Marine element with a Coyote IFV, and especially _two_ biotics – one a tiberium mutant and the other a Commando.

They were geared up for a spec-ops mission, not a shakedown.

"He just walked by, like he was on a mission," Shepard heard a voice as she approached the CIC. A quick glance showed Pressly was talking with someone over the intercom at his console.

_"He's a Spectre. They're always on a mission," _Shepard heard a voice reply from the console - it sounded like Chief Adams, _Normandy's_ head engineer._"You should relax, Pressly, you'll give yourself an ulcer."_

Pressly frowned and closed the channel as the Commander got closer, and then looked up. He gave Shepard a nod.

"Status, Lieutenant?" she asked. This would be a good chance to get some extra scuttlebutt on the operation; Pressly picked up a lot of information thanks to his position, being third-ranking officer on board with a direct line to all the department heads.

"Looks like we had a good transition, Commander," he reported. "Everything's running fine. IES and Tantalus core are both running green. Ion arrays and mass accelerators look to be at one hundred percent too. Nothing shaken by the transition, so no need for recalibrations. There's a murmur in life support, but nothing serious, and I've got a crewman locking it down."

"Heard you talking about our turian guest," Shepard said, gesturing towards the console.

"Talking with Adams in engineering," Pressly said. "He didn't agree with me about what's going on."

"You have some concerns?" Shepard asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, it's just . . . ." Pressly said, and glanced back toward the rear of the CIC, where the comms room was situated. "This doesn't add up."

"A Spectre on a shakedown run doesn't make sense, I know," Shepard said with a nod.

"Exactly," Pressly muttered. "I mean, I know that the Council wants someone to watch over this joint project, and while I hate the idea of a turian looking over my shoulder, I understand why he's here."

"But," Shepard said, her tone leading.

"But there's more to it than that," Pressly said with a nod. "We're just supposed to be testing out the stealth system, so why is Captain Anderson in charge? Plus, we're fully staffed. Why would we need to risk the security leaks to have Marines and extra crew on board instead of just the engineers? We've even got a Coyote stocked down in the cargo bay, loaded for combat."

"Something's up, I agree," Shepard replied, glad to see that someone was echoing her observations. "I'll talk with the Captain when I see him and get some answers. Carry on."

"Aye-aye, ma'am," Pressly replied as Shepard moved past him and around the CIC. It was time to find out the truth behind this shakedown.

The communications room was the most cavernous chamber on the Normandy, intended for briefing the ship's senior officers and department heads. Since it was a frigate, that generally consisted of the ship's head engineer, head pilot, executive officer, Marine officer, and medical officer. It was located behind wall after wall of countermeasures, borne out of a paranoia that had been instilled in GDI doctrine for two centuries.

Today, it held only Nihlus. The turian Spectre was peering over a hologram, showing images of idyllic green fields and forests on the left, and images of green, crystalline glaciers on the right. The former Shepard recognized were from Eden Prime, while the latter she knew were from Earth.

"Ah, Commander," Nihlus said, turning his head to glance at her. "I was hoping you'd get here first. I wanted the chance to talk."

"What about?" she asked, trying to keep the wariness out of her voice.

"This world we're going to, Eden Prime," Nihlus mused. "I've heard many stories about it, and how your species considers it a 'New Earth'."

"I've been there a couple of times," Shepard said. "Beautiful place, especially compared with where we come from."

"I find it curious that no human has a living memory of your homeworld prior to its current state," Nihlus said. "That may be why so many people flock to Eden Prime. You are like the quarians, in many ways."

"So I've heard," Shepard said, wondering where the turian was taking the conversation.

"Like the quarians, your species fought tooth and nail for their place in the galaxy," Nihlus said, green eyes locking onto her. "That I can respect. A lot of turians resent humanity, Shepard, but I like your species."

"Not everyone who fights the turians becomes a client species," Shepard replied. Nihlus nodded, using that curious sideways-downward motion the turians had in place of the standard human nod.

"The only other species that we have gone to war with that did not become clients of the Hierarchy were the krogan," Nihlus replied. "And you know what happened to them. Many in the Hierarchy are angry that we were fought to a standstill by a relative newcomer. Wounded pride, I say."

"Sorry to be blunt," Shepard finally said, getting tired of this, "but if you're trying to say something, just say it."

Nihlus stared back for a moment, and then his mandibles parted in the turian equivalent of a smile.

"I wanted to clear the air between us, Commander," Nihlus said. "My species and yours traded a sea of blood on Shanxi, and I know GDI doesn't trust the Council, let alone a turian Spectre." The turian extended a hand toward her. "I want you to know that I am not your enemy. We can't work together if we're constantly pointing guns at each other's backs."

Shepard regarded him for a moment. Turians were hard to read, but she got the sense he was being honest with her. She reached out and shook his hand, nodding.

"Good to know," she replied. They shook, neither of them pushing the grip more than necessary.

The door hissed open behind them, and the pair looked back, to see Captain Anderson step into the room, clad in his dark gray Navy officer uniform. She snapped a quick salute, and he responded in kind.

"Good to see we're all here," Anderson said. The door sealed behind him. "Nihlus, I think it's time we tell the Commander what's really going on."

Shepard frowned and nodded. Anderson walked across the room and hit the keys in front of the holographic display. The idyllic and nightmarish contrast that had dominated the display before became a series of still shots of what looked like an old ruin, built of an unidentified stone.

Shepard blinked. She knew the architecture; any human who had taken a basic history class recognized the distinctive design of Prothean structures. They perfectly matched the ruins that had been uncovered on Mars decades before the Charon Relay had been discovered – ruins that had contained enough refined element zero that GDI had been able to devise mass effect technology on their own before ever leaving Sol.

"Prothean ruins," Shepard said. "Anything of value in there?"

It was a reasonable question. After all, the Prothean tech they'd uncovered on Mars had allowed GDI to leapfrog their technological development. Tiberium had already allowed the Initiative to manufacture enormous amounts of refined materials with ease, but the advent of mass effect technology allowed them to bypass the energy limitations that made shipping materials to and from Earth so expensive. Mass effect was what allowed them to transport the materials to build the tens of thousands of space habitats around Earth and Mars, and to get billions of humans off of Earth to the much safer orbitals, Martian colonies, and extrasolar colony worlds.

"Yes," Anderson replied. "A mining crew uncovered these ruins about three months ago. Two weeks ago, an archeological team uncovered a working piece of Prothean technology. The translated script marked it as a "beacon," but from what they've been able to tell, it appears to be some kind of data archive."

Shepard frowned, mulling over that fact. Prothean technology formed the tech base for all of the galaxy's sapient species. GDI made heavy use of the element zero-based technology originally devised by the Protheans, alongside their own tiberium-based tech. The Initiative was still forced to make do with what they had developed themselves, as their lukewarm relations with the Citadel meant that their understanding of mass effect technology lagged behind. An intact Prothean data cache could change that disparity quickly.

Nihlus was watching her, and the turian nodded slightly as he read her features. She now understood why he was here.

"Obviously, this goes beyond mere human interests," the Spectre said. "A discovery of this magnitude could affect all of Citadel space, as well as GDI."

"The Council sent you to make sure that they got their cut?" Shepard asked, and Nihlus nodded again.

"Why are we sharing this with the Citadel?" she asked, looking to Anderson. "Eden Prime is a human world. We aren't part of the Citadel. They have no claim over it."

"We may not be part of the Citadel," Anderson explained, "but we aren't enemies. Allowing them to share this beacon shows them our willingness to cooperate with them."

"It doesn't help that you're at war with a former member of the Citadel," Nihlus added, tone dry. "And the Citadel doesn't want to lose technological parity with anyone, least of all GDI."

In other words, Shepard thought, the Citadel wanted to keep on being the biggest dog in the galactic kennel. The Initiative did not have military parity with the Citadel, but they were close enough to be a serious contender thanks to a powerful heavy industry core along with ion cannon and sonic weapons technology. But despite their differing weaponry, GDI had a smaller overall economy, and the Citadel had a vastly greater population, territory, economy, and technology base. Their mass effect technology was superior, especially in non-Relay faster than light travel, which gave them a major edge. Not to mention the Salarian Union, whose Special Tasks Group made GDI's InOps division look like rank amateurs. And the Citadel was closing the gap in armaments, if the rumors about their ion cannon prototypes were true.

It was the same problem GDI had faced a century ago with the Brotherhood of Nod: a rival who was faster and more maneuverable and had a definite edge in intelligence and numbers. If GDI and the Citadel came to blows, it would be very, very bloody. Making good with the Citadel was the smart thing to do, politically and militarily.

"So why the secrecy?" Shepard asked, after processing that.

"We're not the only ones who can make use of this tech," Anderson said. "The Hegemony is our biggest concern."

"Not to mention other possible threats," Nihlus said. "Some species in the Terminus Systems might consider attacking a GDI colony if they could get their hands on the beacon."

"Terminus attacks, it's an act of war," Shepard said. "We've already shown the batarians what we do in response to provocation."

"It might be worth it, in some groups' eyes," Anderson said. "And there are any number of other threats. Brotherhood insurgents, for one."

Shepard remembered the Nod fleet she'd seen seven years ago, and nodded, though to Anderson it was simply one of agreement as opposed to deep understanding. Nod tech was already fearsome without a high-value Prothean data cache in their hands.

"So what's the plan?" she asked.

"We land, acquire the Beacon from the Marines securing it, and withdraw," Nihlus said.

"Simple enough."

"The best plans are," the Spectre agreed. "I'm more worried about whether we'll be attacked en route or after leaving with the beacon-"

"Captain!" Joker's voice cut in over the intercom. _"Sorry to interrupt, but we've got an incoming distress call from Eden Prime!"_

A half-second of shocked silence fell over the room, but Anderson was already moving in that pause. He hit a couple of keys on the display's control panel.

"Send it to us," the Captain barked.

A second later, the display shifted to show a blood-red sky, smoke rising into the air, and they could hear the sound of gunfire: the rapid, lighter roar of mass accelerators, the crack of railguns, and the hiss and roar of ion cannons. The camera filming the image was located inside what looked like a forest on a cliff overlooking a wide field. In the background, they could see the spikes of city habitats rising up along the fields and plains.

GDI soldiers were visible in the feed, firing weapons at unseen threats. They were clad in the brown, tan, and green earth-tones standard to the GDI military, and about half of them wore the light powered armor that was ubiquitous in Citadel, Terminus, and GDI space. The other half wore Zone armor.

The term had been coined for the various Zones on Earth, each defined by Tiberium infestation. Zone armor had been developed initially to help protect infantrymen who patrolled and fought in Yellow and Red Zones, but had developed into sophisticated powered combat armor that had become the backbone of GDI's infantry corps. The original suits had been huge and bulky, making the wearer look like plate-armored gorillas in plate armor. These suits were more compact, but still hefty enough to put the wearer at well over two meters in height, which matched the size of the enormous Werewolf weapons they carried.

One of the Zone Troopers turned toward the camera, firing the weapon past the camera's POV. The crack of a railgun sounded over the camera's speakers. A second later, the trooper stepped forward, waving the off-hand and pushing the camera operator to the ground.

"Get down!" a woman's voice could be heard over the speakers, filtered by the suit. More gunfire roared, from a second weapon mounted in the Trooper's Werewolf, this time firing automatic bursts. A moment later, another soldier, wearing the lighter standard armor, ducked into view. He was speaking something, but it took a moment for the camera's microphone to pick up.

"_-peat, communications are being jammed on all frequencies_!" the soldier said. _"We are under fire by unknown hostile forces, multiple-" _The voice faded and the camera's feed flashed to static for several seconds as something exploded beyond the camera's line of sight. The soldier came back, distant and garbled. They could hear a new sound, a deep, low series of roaring pulses. White bolts the size of a human head screamed over the GDI soldier in time to the strange howling.

"_-heavy casualties!"_ the soldier continued. _"Dig site has been compromised! Repeat, dig site has been compromised! Attempting to regroup at-"_

There was a flash of light, and the soldier jerked and was hurled off his feet. The gunfire intensified, and the camera suddenly keeled over, falling on its side.

A horrific noise suddenly filled the speakers, and the GDI soldiers recoiled for a moment. The gunfire ceased, and the soldiers' heads tracked upward, as if following something out of sight. Something bumped the camera, and it rolled over to point at the sky.

Something sheathed in metal roared down through the smoke clouds, appearing to be a hand of serrated metal. Red lightning crackled among the "fingers" as it descended toward the camera, still kilometers away. Shepard stared at the image, and shuddered as she remembered the last time she'd seen anything remotely similar. The lightning then had been cold blue, and the alien shapes had been formed of crystal and jet-black metal.

The noise faded, and as the distant sounds of combat came back, they could hear another noise, mixed in with the background thunder of combat. A sound like slithering and metallic hissing, like hundreds or thousands of tiny serpents, filtered in over the speakers, and Shepard jerked, fear shooting through her on pure reflex.

She knew that sound, and phantom pains ran through her skin as she remembered.

A heartbeat later, the gunfire picked up, GDI troops shouting in sudden alarm. One of the soldiers stepped back into view of the camera.

A cloud of glittering chrome string _poured_ onto the screen. There was nothing else to describe it; silver whisps of thread lashed across the camera's line of sight into the soldier, and he jerked in terror. She heard him screaming in agony as more of the strands streamed into view and fell over him.

Shepard took a step back, shivering, memories of the last time she'd heard such screams lashing up at her. The soldier arched backward, and she saw his arm simply slide off, falling apart with blood flowing from ripped seams in the plating. The soldier toppled over, head falling from his torso, blood pouring out of his armor as the body collapsed into a disparate tangle of limbs and armor.

The silvery threads flowed out of the shredded corpse, and swarmed out of sight, while more clouds of the deadly, lethal blades flowed after them.

The camera's feed then went dark.

"_Cuts out after that,"_ Joker's voice came in, subdued. _"Just static."_

"Rewind," Anderson whispered. "Hold at 38.12."

The video rewound to show the metallic hand, lightning pouring around its fingers. Anderson stared for a moment. Nihlus' mandibles twitched a few times, a turian gesture Shepard didn't recognize.

"Fast-forward to 41.40," Anderson said.

The video advanced to showing the silvery threads slicing into the GDI trooper. The Captain stared at it for a moment, and then glanced back to Shepard.

"You recognize this, Commander," he said quietly. It wasn't a question.

Shepard slowly nodded. She was the only living human who'd ever seen this weaponry in action before. The memory made her shudder, and pains flickered across her face, at the scars running over her features – scars she'd gotten nearly a decade ago, on a world called Akuze.

"What are they?" Nihlus asked. "I have never seen this weapon before."

"They're called buzzers," Shepard said quietly. "Tiny blades that travel in swarms. They fly into you through seams in your armor, or cut holes in your suits, and then they . . . ." She shuddered again.

"You encountered them on Akuze," Nihlus said, and she nodded. The trio shared a look, and they understood that matters had just gotten a lot worse than their most dire expectations.

The Scrin were on Eden Prime.

* * *

_**Codex - Global Defense Initiative - Diplomatic Relations**_

_In the years since contact was made between GDI and the __**Citadel Council**__, the Initiative has maintained its own independence and technological parity with the Citadel, due to GDI's powerful industrial capability due to Tiberium, and their advanced weapons technology, developed prior to the discovery of mass effect. GDI's refusal to join the Citadel and acknowledge Council authority was in no small part due to GDI's extensive use of Electronic Virtual Agents, which by Citadel standards were considered "shackled" artificial intelligences, and thus illegal. GDI refusal to adhere to the Treaty of Firaxen as well as refusal to share access to active Tiberium are also hot-point issues. Nonetheless, GDI has maintained open diplomatic relations, and has an embassy on the Citadel - the only non-Citadel species to maintain such a facility._

_GDI relations with the __**Turian Hierarchy**__ are strained, due to the heavy losses both sides suffered during the Shanxi War's ground and space battles. Though the two nations maintain active trade and have made some effort at mutual sharing of technology and expertise, tensions between the two states remain difficult._

_On the other hand, GDI relations with the __**Asari Republics**__ and the __**Salarian Union**__ are more cordial, if still strained due to political tensions. The Initiative maintains active trade with asari space, but fears of infiltration by salarian Special Task Group agents and other arms of the salarians' famed espionage network have resulted in widespread human distrust and paranoia around salarians._

_GDI is currently in a state of open war with the __**Batarian Hegemony**__ over the sponsoring of pirate and slaver attacks on human colonies. There are currently no diplomatic talks between the two states._

_Though the __**krogan**__ have no centralized government, there is a sort of mutual respect between humans and krogans, due to the similar hardships they have both suffered on their homeworlds. Though krogan are commonly viewed as violent criminals or mercenaries - a reputation many krogan enjoy living down to - it is not uncommon for human and krogan mercenary or criminal groups to work in concert. Krogan are commonly hired as bodyguards for humans, and alongside the quarians, are one of the most common alien species encountered in GDI space._

_The quarian __**Migrant Fleet**__ is the only recognized non-human government to maintain open and warm relations with the Initiative, springing from widespread human sympathy for the quarians' plight due to past conflicts with both out-of-control artificial intelligences and alien forces that have ravaged their homeworld. In return for GDI-manufactured materials, the Migrant Fleet supplies quarian engineers and miners, whose expertise at extracting and refining both helium-3 and element zero make them valued workers. Small groups of quarians are a common sight on many GDI colony worlds that either handle element zero or rely on helium-3 due to intense restrictions on tiberium-derived fuel exports from Sol. Breakaway flotillas from the Migrant Fleet are seen frequently in human border systems._

_GDI maintains a watchful eye over the colonies of the __**Brotherhood of Nod**__, and trade and diplomatic communication with the existing sects continues._ _Relations between the Brotherhood and GDI are strained at times due to the actions of extremists and mutual suspicion borne out of half a century of previous conflict. The UHAT treaty that limits Brotherhood military capability is also a source of constant tension between the factions._


	3. Chapter 3: Reconnoiter

_**Chapter Three: Scouting**_

For Lieutenant Commander Harry Rivalto, commanding officer of Ion Array EP-4, the day went from annoying to horrific in the span of a few seconds. He'd woken up with his back stiff and head pounding due to last night's leave, and then discovered that no one had made coffee in his station's mess. Then, after he'd donned his uniform, updated himself on all incoming traffic for the system, and walked into the station's command center, he witnessed one of the orbital ion cannons over Eden Prime shatter from a direct central hit by mass accelerator fire.

There was a heartbeat of frozen confusion in the command center, a dozen faces locked on the main screen showing Orbital Ion Cannon EP-14-Alpha explode, and then Rivalto in turn exploded into motion.

"EVA, intercom!" he yelled. "All crew, general quarters! Spool up the generators! We are under attack!"

The command center burst into motion as if a grenade had gone off, and Rivalto brought up data on the main screen, showing an orbital plot of all the ships over Eden Prime, as well as the orbital defenses. He could feel the station below him shift as weapons rotated to address the new threat and engines fired to keep it maneuvering out of long-range enemy fire.

There were a total of about fifty ion cannon satellites scattered in orbit around the planet, along with six ion array stations at the planet's Lagrange Points. Each of the squat stations were enormous, flattened metal discs which mounted an array of six dreadnought-grade ion cannons - enough firepower to obliterate almost any attacking ship, and capable of giving pause to even the Citadel's mightiest warship, the _Destiny_ _Ascension_. There was also a small flotilla in-system, consisting of four cruisers and sixteen frigates; Eden Prime's proximity to Earth and Arcturus, plus how deep it was in GDI territory, meant that it hadn't needed a large garrison fleet. Those ships were needed in the colonies in the Verge and Traverse.

That decision appeared to have been in error.

As Rivalto watched, the ion cannon satellites surrounding the section of orbital space guarded by his Array continued to fly apart, one every few seconds. Flares of light erupted along the sides of the intact units as they initiated automated evasion routines, but whatever was shooting at them was still able to hit them.

"EVA, calculate trajectory on those rounds!" he ordered. This was exactly what had happened when the turians had invaded Shanxi. The turians hadn't expected the firepower of Shanxi's ion cannon defenses and had blundered into their shots during the first engagement. Afterward, they'd parked their cruisers out of immediate range and fired precisely calculated mass accelerator shots to pick off the satellites from light-seconds away.

Except back then the satellites had been stationary; whoever was shooting at them was picking off moving targets. Rivalto could only watch in frustration as the guns were blasted apart. Worse still, the armor on the satellites was rated to repel at least a couple of hits from cruiser-grade guns, but these weapons were punching clean through their armor. Either someone had some beefy cruiser-sized ships, or they were fighting dreadnoughts.

"Commander, main guns are seventy percent charged," reported one of his officers, and Rivalto nodded.

"Any contact from Bastion?" he asked. Bastion was the callsign for GDI's military headquarters on Eden Prime.

"No sir," replied his communications officer. "They're still scrambling to figure out what's going on. We've got Firestorm barriers going up on the ground." The man frowned. "I've got additional mass accelerator impacts on the surface around the capital. They're . . . hitting the Firestorm generators around the city."

"Then that's their target," Rivalto murmured, nodding.

"Commander," the station's EVA cut in. "Calculations complete. Plotting trajectory of incoming rounds."

"Get me a camera sweep of that entire section of space," Rivalto ordered. "I want to know what we're dealing with."

Another ion cannon flew apart. The enemy fire was disturbingly accurate, despite the automated evasion protocols, and they didn't seem to care about surface collateral damage. In less than a minute, he guessed, the only thing protecting this stretch of Eden Prime's orbit would be his own station.

The main screen lit up with a blank section of space at an oblique angle to their orbit. EVA's trajectory plotting put the shots as coming from that general area, which meant whoever was firing was aiming their shots so that they wouldn't impact the planet if they missed the ion cannons. That meant that every shot that was hitting the surface must have been deliberately aimed at a surface target.

Seconds passed, and Rivalto attempted to contact Bastion again. There was no response; they were apparently still trying to find their heads and asses and sort out which was which. Typical military bureaucracy.

The screen then shifted to show a real-time video of images from that section of space, and the commander's heart leapt into his throat.

There was a huge fleet out there. EVA counted more than a hundred ships of an unknown design, while in the center of the fleet was an enormous shape of dark metal, larger than any dreadnought he'd ever seen, even a _Glacier_-class. The image was only a few light-seconds old; they were at the outermost edge of the ion cannons' effective range, but the GDI defenders could still hit them.

"EVA, feed this directly to Bastion," he ordered. "Trajectory, location, targeting data, everything."

"Guns are ninety percent charged," called the gunnery officer. Another ion cannon blew apart. Chunks of it rained down into the atmosphere, igniting and leaving golden tails stretching behind them.

"Get me a targeting solution on that dreadnought," Rivalto ordered. If they could fire now, it would take precious seconds for the beams to propagate toward the threat, but they just might be able to disrupt the attacking fleet and knock out their dreadnought. The beams would partially diffuse at that range, but they'd impact with enough energy to take out any known vessel regardless.

"Solution acquired," EVA said as another satellite was destroyed. Only two more remained.

"Fire."

The station shuddered as six eighty meter long ion cannons locked onto their target, and released a massive stream of charged particles. The noise was incredible, permeating his bones and shaking his mind. He watched on the screen as three other arrays followed suit, firing their cannons maybe a second later.

Then, on the seconds-old video feed of the target area, the invading fleet vanished.

"No," Rivalto hissed. "Dammit, no-"

The fleet appeared, more than a hundred warships, less than five kilometers away and spread across the orbit of Eden Prime. The majority of the ships were curiously rounded vessels of cruiser or frigate tonnage, looking like wingless wasps with their legs tucked tight against their bodies.

In the middle of the fleet, however, was an enormous warship, shaped like a massive, black metal squid with red running lights. The monstrous dreadnought was over two kilometers long, and wreathed in red lightning. The tremendous shape inspired a sudden flare of panic in Rivalto.

A heartbeat after they'd come out of faster-than-light speed, the last ion satellite blew apart, leaving Array EP-4 alone.

"Charge the guns!" Rivalto ordered. "Dump the reserve capacitors into the cannons!"

The reserves were intended for when the cannons needed to be fired quickly. Firing them so soon after a previous discharge would likely damage the barrels due to massive overheating, but Rivalto knew that being bombed to debris by incoming dreadnought fire would be far worse than simple overheating.

In the back of his mind, Rivalto also realized what the enemy had planned.

_They knew our response times, and how we'd backtrack the shots,_ he realized. _They waited until they knew we'd fired, and then used FTL to close in, forcing us to waste our ion cannons' shots._

"Clever bastards," he breathed.

"Guns charged!" yelled the gunnery officer.

"Target the dreadnought," Rivalto ordered as the alien fleet closed in. "Blow it to hell."

The ion cannons thundered again, loosing azure columns of charged particles at the invaders. The dreadnought didn't try to evade, which would have been pointless anyway; at that close a range, there was no way it could dodge. Shuddering howls ran through the array's structure as components melted or blew out within the guns.

The ion beams slammed into the dreadnought's shields, a flare of light momentarily dazzled the video feed, and EVA attempted to compensate.

One of the more curious properties of an ion cannon was how it interacted with a kinetic barrier. The barriers were designed to fend off direct hits from mass accelerator rounds moving at high speeds. The kinetic barriers didn't block the charged particles of an ion cannon blast, but they did manage to diffuse the beams – moreso with modern cyclonic barriers than the original designs during the Shanxi War. Some of the beam still managed to bleed through the shields regardless of the disruptive nature of the barriers, and a direct hit with an ion cannon was guaranteed damage to an enemy warship. A well-aimed ion beam could knock out an enemy ship in a single shot.

Six such beams tore into the alien dreadnought, smashing into and through its shields, pouring enough firepower to wipe out any ship in Citadel space into the enemy hull.

"Direct hit," EVA reported, and there was a low murmur of satisfaction through the command center. The glare faded, and the sensor feeds picked back up.

Rivalto stared.

"That is . . . so unfair," one of the officers whispered.

The dreadnought sported a ragged, glowing line along its bow, maybe three hundred meters long. With the exception of that single glowing gash along its hull, the alien vessel wasn't even scratched.

But they had caught its attention, for the dreadnought slowed down and pivoted to face the station.

"Recharge the guns," Rivalto said. "Full charge, now! Hurry! EVA, engage with point defense weapons!"

The stations' conventional mass accelerators opened up, loosing streamers of hypervelocity rounds into the dreadnought as it closed, but it was like throwing rocks at a tank. They deflected off the vessel's barriers without doing any meaningful harm.

The dreadnought came about, slowing steadily, and faced Array EP-4. Rivalto had a sudden, overwhelming feeling that the dreadnought saw _him_, right through the video feed.

"Guns at twenty percent!" the gunnery officer cried out.

The dreadnought's "fingers" began to uncurl, pointing toward the station.

"Dump all nonessential power into the guns," Rivalto ordered, trying to keep himself calm as the fingers pointed toward his station.

"Guns at fifty percent!" the gunnery officer yelled a second later.

Glowing light coalesced at the tips of those fingers.

"Fire!" Rivalto ordered, unable to wait any longer. The gunnery officer's finger pressed down on the fire controls-

Four thin lines of immensely hot liquid metal lanced out, hit the barriers of Array EP-4, and tore through them in an instant. With calm, clinical callousness, the four blades of molten metal, each no thicker than a human's forearm, sliced apart the array. They started with the power generation systems, then the weapons, and terminated at the crew sections. Lieutenant Commander Rivalto saw all of this happen over the span of a single second, before the dreadnought's beam boiled through his command center and flash-fried everyone in the room before they could register the heat.

Array EP-4 fell apart without any immense flashes of light or detonations, the pieces sliding away from one another like cut paper dropped into an ocean. The alien dreadnought turned away from the obliterated station, and continued on toward the planet below, where the rest of its fleet had already started the invasion.

* * *

_**Four hours later**_

Nihlus stepped off the elevator leading to the _Normandy's_ hangar deck, and he found himself faced with another reminder of GDI's military design philosophy. An M-45 Coyote Infantry Fighting Vehicle loomed directly in front of him on eight armored wheels, supporting a large, blocky, sloping frame. On top was a turret that mounted a heavy multipurpose cannon, and the whole thing was painted in the gray-gold color scheme GDI adhered to almost religiously. The vehicle was huge, well-armed, heavily armored, and as subtle as a battalion of angry krogan soldiers.

In other words, a perfect mirror of GDI itself.

" . . . will go right through our barriers, so don't stand in the open. Keep cover between you and any Scrin you see; we're not going to get the reaction cushion we normally get against enemies with mass accelerators, and our barriers won't protect us while airborne or bounding. Terrain precludes the Coyote, so we're going to have to be extra careful without its fire support."

Shepard stood on the far end of the hangar, surrounded by the Normandy's entire current Marine complement. There were ten Marines there, not including Shepard herself and the mutant biotic, Alenko. Half of them wore standard-issue armor, with jump packs the size of a briefcase affixed to the backs of the gray-brown hardsuits. The other half wore the heavy, bulky Zone armor, and carried enormous, boxy Werewolf guns.

Nihlus was clad in his own personal armor, though he too had donned a jump pack, a rounded device of turian design. This one was a modular attachment instead of the integrated devices the GDI soldiers carried. After they'd encountered GDI's jump pack-equipped troops on Shanxi, the turians had been quick to adopt and improve on the design, and the devices had spread throughout Citadel space.

"What about buzzers, ma'am?" asked one of the Zone Marines, a human Nihlus had noted to be overly enthusiastic. What was his name? Jenkins?

"All the evidence indicates that buzzers are a hive-minded entity," she explained, and Nihlus noticed the quiet quake in her voice. "Kill one, it disrupts the link with the others. Kill enough, and it causes some kind of feedback effect through the whole swarm that causes the rest to either go catatonic or die. They're hard to hit with conventional weapons, but if you put enough rounds into a swarm you'll hit something. Fire, explosives, grenades, sonic weapons, all work on them, since their surface area is small and they don't have armor. Biotics, too." She glanced to Alenko. "Hit them with a warping field and it kills the swarm almost instantly."

The lieutenant nodded. He wore a similar set of armor as Shepard, which Nihlus gathered was some type of biotics-amplifying hardsuit. They both wore jump packs as well, though Nihlus noted Alenko's Werewolf was configured for close combat, only having a submachinegun and sonic grenade attachments. Shepard's weapon had a standard assault rifle loadout, with an attached sonic-grenade launcher and armor-piercing railgun modules. The rest of the squad was much more heavily armed, with light machinegun configurations and attached sonic grenade launchers. The Zone Marines' weapons had light ion cannon, missile launcher, and railgun modules, as well as a standard light machinegun base.

"Shepard," Nihlus said as he approached, and she looked up at him. Human faces, like asari, were made of soft skin and cartilage, but unlike asari, they didn't repair quite so easily, and as a result they scarred much more readily. The ragged tears stretching over her face were a testament to that fact.

"Nihlus," she said. "You been briefed?"

"I reviewed the files I had access to," the turian replied, nodding. Data about the Scrin had been forthcoming after GDI had made contact with the Citadel. Some were skeptical about the danger the aliens posed to the Citadel, but Nihlus had recognized the potential threat when he'd learned of it. The Scrin didn't use mass effect technology, but instead relied on technology derived from Tiberium. That alone made them a vastly more potent threat, simply because of their nonstandard capabilities.

"They're freaky bastards," Shepard said, tone grim, "but they die like anything else if you shoot them enough. You just have to know how." Nihlus nodded in agreement.

"We'll likely run into something unexpected down there," remarked another of the Zone Troopers. "It's been a long time since we fought a conventional war with the Scrin."

"We took them on Akuze," Jenkins countered.

"We got our asses kicked on Akuze," another retorted. "Commander's the only one who lived through that."

"Or we might not be fighting just the Scrin," Alenko cut in, drawing their attention. "That giant hand thing looked nothing like any Scrin ship on record. Same for those wasp-ships."

"You know the plan when we encounter something we've never seen before," Shepard cut in. "We shoot it until it goes down, and figure out the rest after we kill it." She paused, looked behind Nihlus, and went rigid. "Captain on deck."

The other humans all went rigid as well, their form of showing respect to their commander. Nihlus stepped back and let Anderson stride past him.

"Shepard," he said. "We're dropping in ten. You understand your objectives?" She nodded.

"Secure the dig site and the beacon, and remove it for extraction," she said. "All other priorities are secondary."

"Nihlus will be on recon," Anderson said. "Observe radio silence otherwise."

She glanced to Nihlus and nodded. He replied with the same gesture as she closed her helmet, the metal on the angular, flat-sided headgear locking down and fully sealing her face from view.

"The mission is yours, now. Good luck, Commando," Anderson added, and she hesitated, before nodding again. As far as Nihlus understood it, that term had a special connotation among GDI; it wasn't just a role, but also a mark of status and respect among humans. To be called a "Commando" among the GDI military was apparently similar to being named battlemaster among the krogan, but with less emphasis on authority and more on skill and experience. In one word, Anderson had apparently told Shepard terabytes in regards to his respect for her.

Or perhaps Nihlus was reading the humans incorrectly.

"Approaching the LZ in five," called Joker over the intercom a few moments later, and the squad of assault Marines moved toward the main bay doors. Anderson stayed back from the doors, but stayed and watch his team as they departed.

The doors hissed open, and myriad smells and sounds flooded in. Nihlus caught sight of a blood-red sky, stained with smoke and fire, and he could see blue flashes and hear the roar of wind and explosions. He saw white buildings, some ablaze, and fields of green that had been stained russet by the sky.

Nihlus checked his weapons, and nodded, readying himself. There was fear, instinctive and inescapable, but decades of combat had taught him to master that anxiety, to forge it into a tool that he could use against his enemy. He steadied himself, and glanced to the humans. It was hard to read their faces, despite their similarity to the asari, and even harder now that their expressions were sealed behind the angular, full-face helmets or Zone armor canopies, but he knew the anxiety that they had to be feeling, mixed with anger at this enemy who had attacked one of their worlds.

The _GDS_ _Normandy_ came to a halt, over a clear patch of grass in a wooded ridgeline out of sight of the dig site, and they leapt out into the open air. Jump packs flared as they dropped, slowing their descent until they hit the dirt a few moments later at a controlled pace, the grass rising up to greet their booted feet. The eleven members of the assault team landed in a near-perfect circle, weapons facing outward.

Nothing stirred, save a few local animals. No contact with any threats appeared on their radars. Nihlus glanced to Shepard as the team lowered their weapons, and then nodded to her.

"Target is seven kilometers east of here," he said, checking his map, and the data flashed on their HUDs. Without another word, Nihlus engaged his jump pack and launched away from the clearing, bounding over the trees. The GDI Marines followed a few moments later, letting him gain a lead so he could reconnoiter.

* * *

Captain David Anderson stood in the _Normandy's_ CIC as it lurked out of sight, optical and thermal stealth systems active, and watched Eden Prime burn.

He'd gone in expecting to see the familiar weapons he'd studied in officer school. The Scrin had used fast, beam-armed fighters supporting massive airborne warships equipped with banks of forward-firing plasma weapons and enormous "carriers" loaded with short-range drone fighters. The vessels he saw flying over Eden Prime were nothing of the sort - in fact, they didn't resemble anything like the Scrin's disturbing living-crystal designs. The wasp-shaped vessels were something new, moving over the colony and firing into defensive concentrations with weapons that resembled mass accelerators sheathed in electrical discharges or blazing blue-white plasma.

"EVA," Anderson ordered, peering at the alien vessels. "Run a comparison profile of those ships."

The AI complied while Anderson watched how the ground battle was progressing. He'd already seen the remnants of the orbital battle; the enemy had destroyed most of the ion cannons without trouble. They had faced more of a challenge with the paltry defense fleet that had been orbiting the colony, judging by the spreading clouds of debris over the planet, but had traded their ships for GDI's at a roughly one-to-one ratio.

The invaders had landed and established a perimeter approximately twenty kilometers across, centered on the enormous dreadnought that had landed at the main spaceport of Eden Prime's capital, rather creatively named . . . Eden Prime. Of the invaders' vessels, roughly half of them were frigate tonnage, with maybe a half-dozen cruiser-sized vessels. More than half of the alien fleet appeared to have been destroyed, either by the orbital defenses or ground fire, and most of the surviving frigates appeared to be damaged badly; the surface anti-air defenses packed a hell of a punch. The majority of the GDI anti-air defenses had been wiped out, however, and the Firestorm generators around Eden Prime's capital had been destroyed before they could power up. Without air defenses, the warships were able to hover over the city and the plains beyond, and destroy any concentrations of resistance they encountered.

Anderson frowned as he looked over the aliens' positions. They were clearly defending their current perimeter, and doing it with unmatchable ferocity; the warships weren't hesitating to level city blocks to wipe out the GDI garrison still fighting their ground troops. That wasn't going to last, though, for the _Normandy's_ sensors were showing large concentrations of GDI ground forces en route to the beleaguered capital, moving out from bases guarded by the glowing, pyramidal Firestorm defenses. The immensely powerful jamming field that was disrupting their communications was only marginally slowing down response times.

Still, if the ground forces got into a slugging match with those warships, it was going to be a bloody massacre on both ends. The sheer, massed firepower a GDI tank division could put out could overwhelm even a warship's barriers, but it could do the same right back, and could still go orbital and bomb them from space. The only reason they were this low in the atmosphere was to secure their perimeter.

What was throwing him off was the aliens' positioning. They had secured the city, but were more than thirty kilometers from the dig site itself. It was as if they were ignoring the dig site completely.

_Ignoring,_ Anderson thought, _or drawing attention away from it._

"Analysis complete," EVA's voice chimed in. "Match found with 76% probability."

"Show me," Anderson said, looking up. The holographic display shifted to show a rough match for the ships they were looking at, but as he stared at it, only more questions rose up.

"Geth?" he whispered, thoroughly confused. What the hell were the geth doing here, attacking a human world, on the far side of the Perseus Veil?

* * *

Nihlus heard the sounds of combat maybe a kilometer away, far closer than the rest of the battle going on many kilometers east of the dig site.

Why were the ground forces so far east of the dig site? Nihlus figured that it was a distraction, to draw the attention away from the force at the excavation; nothing else made immediate sense based on what he knew.

What he knew was still very little. He'd tried contacting Shepard, but the jamming was too intense. He'd expected to have encountered Scrin forces around the dig site, but with the exception of a number of slain human civilians and soldiers and some hostile sentry drones with conventional configurations, there was minimal presence. That meant that the enemy may well have acquired their objective already.

He counted no fewer than ten hostiles around the dig site itself. Nothing he couldn't handle with a little observation and preparation, but it wasn't his job to kill on this mission – it was to observe. Shepard's team had the firepower.

This enemy. It was strange, but as he'd moved through the hills, woods, and ruins and had observed the enemy, he rapidly became convinced they were a breed of synthetic lifeforms, though he was unfamiliar with them. Something about their design reminded him of . . . .

"Quarians," Nihlus murmured, checking the recordings he'd taken of the first few he'd seen. He then emerged from cover and moved up toward the pair he'd sighted, heading west. He got a dozen meters closer, and carefully observed them.

They were humanoid, lithe, slender synthetics built of a dark gray metal, with black exposed cabling running outside their bodies. Their heads were serpentine, ending with gleaming lights that were no doubt their sensor systems. Dark, oblong rifles were held in their hands, and everything about their design was curved and smooth, like they had been sculpted from marble instead of assembled from metal. And their proportions and body structure - three-fingered hands, a leg structure akin to the reverse arrangement of turian legs - closely resembled quarian body structure.

And they were intelligent. They weren't VI-driven drones or combat machines. They moved and operated like thinking entities, and the buzzing sounds they were making were obvious communications. Little doubt remained in Nihlus' mind as he moved away from the synthetics, circling around the ruins.

They were geth.

Geth had emerged from beyond the Perseus Veil. The quarians' rebellious synthetic creations had finally broken their isolation and joined in a massive assault on a human planet, in order to acquire the device in this dig site.

Why would the geth participate in a war against humans? Was the device really so valuable as to draw something that isolationist out of hiding, to attack a colony on the far side of the galaxy?

The geth were moving away from the ruins. He double-checked the topography maps, and his mandibles widened a hair. There was what looked like a small human settlement near the dig site – a series of trailers for the archeologists, and a short distance away, a rail line for the construction teams that had unearthed the ruins in the first place, which in turn ran to a rail hub that was attached to the main spaceport in the city.

The geth were headed that way, and judging by his sensors, there were more in that direction. If they were headed in that direction, that was as good a reason as any to reconnoiter.

Nihlus rose and advanced through the ruins, keeping his distance from the enemy, and continued the search for both his objective and answers.

* * *

Jump pack operations in a forest were always ugly, and Shepard was on edge as they bounded through the woods three kilometers west of the excavation. Wooded areas were possibly the worst place to be using jump packs outside of an enclosed space or underground. Visibility was limited inside the forest, and if one jumped over the top of the canopy, going up that high ran the risk of hitting a big branch that could cause all manner of problems. Meanwhile, coming down ran the same risks, with added danger of not hitting a branch but instead slamming headlong into a tree trunk.

As a result, the GDI assault team had to move on foot as much as they did through the air, using their jump packs for quick hops across difficult terrain. Even so, the ten-man team made excellent time toward their target, and would have crossed the seven kilometers from the LZ to the dig site in under ten minutes.

Then the lead Zone Marine, Corporal Davis, leapt straight into a glowing streak of blue-white energy. The impact vaporized half his body, and sent the smoking, molten remains of his armor tumbling backward. His corpse had yet to hit the dirt when the entire forest went up in a hellish blue-white crossfire as dozens of hostile contacts suddenly appeared on their sensors, element zero cores jolting to life.

Shepard snapped up her rifle as she hit the ground, recognizing the ambush. In the span between the sudden burst of incoming fire and her weapon rising, she analyzed the situation. There were at least twenty and upwards of thirty hostile presences, arranged in a classic L-shaped ambush to their front and right, with the corner of the L anchored by a much larger eezo mass, probably a support weapon. Somehow, in spite of the suddenness of their arrival and the speed of their movement through the woods, the enemy had been able to maneuver a force to intercept them, power down their eezo cores, and spring a perfectly-prepared ambush.

The standard solution to being ambushed was simple. First, get out of the killzone, and second, close to annihilate the ambushers. She pivoted to her right, sighted the enemy, and noted the distance – about fifty meters away. Shots were pouring in from the trees, blue pulses of light that did not resemble the photon beams or other plasma weapons typically used by the Scrin.

"Squad, fire and advance! Team One and Three, assault at three! Team Two, suppress at twelve!" Shepard yelled. As one, the GDI soldiers whirled in place the moment they touched the ground, and activated their jetpacks, bounded forward across the brush and rough terrain directly toward one of the lines of the ambush. Their weapons roared as they did so, returning fire as they charged out of the killzone. Sonic grenades, heavy anti-material rounds, hypervelocity bullets, and ion cannon beams rippled out from the line of GDI troops as they hurled themselves at the enemy. The shots landed amongst the foe, smashing into tree trunks or tearing through undergrowth. The first and third fireteams poured shots at the line they were assaulting while the second loosed suppressing fire at the other line.

Shepard landed within twenty meters of their attackers, noting her shields depleted to about fifty percent from a bevy of impacts. That was another telling factor; the aliens' weapons were deflected by her kinetic barriers. If these were Scrin, their shots would have partially bypassed the kinetic barriers, like photon or phasic ammunition modifications. She got closer, and the realized with a start that she wasn't facing Scrin at all.

The "creatures" before her, spaced out in a ragged line behind the rapidly-splintering tree trunks, were lithe, humanoid things built out of a smooth, dark metal. They had serpentine upper bodies with long, curving "necks" that ended in a head that resembled a flashlight wearing a hood. Shepard had never seen these creatures personally before, but vague memories from her history lessons popped up even as she sighted one in her Werewolf's sights.

Geth. Sapient constructs built by the quarians three hundred years ago as laborers, which had promptly rebelled, slaughtered their masters and forced them off their homeworld into the Migrant Fleet. And now they were here, on Eden Prime, killing humans and firing glittering blue pulses into her squad.

She snarled, pushing her anger down and harnessing the cold hatred. The nearest geth was suddenly lifted up off its feet by an inverted field of gravity, and she raised her Werewolf. The weapon's mass accelerator barked out a staccato of quick bursts, the first three battering down the geth's shields, and the last shredding its torso. White fluid erupted from the synthetic's body, and it fell to the forest floor.

_Geth shields are stronger than average,_ she thought as she bounded forward, firing at the next synthetic. _Reduced armor when compared with turian or batarian. Disrupting shields is a priority._

The woods all around her were exploding. The GDI return fire was tearing through trees and synthetics with equal aplomb; the geth had strong kinetic barriers, but the GDI soldiers had heavier armor, and more importantly, a hell of a lot more firepower. Sonic grenades shattered their way through trees, hurling clouds of bark in all directions, while anti-armor rounds punched clear through the wood and the synthetics on the other side.

She caught a glimpse of Kaidan as he dropped down through the storm of interweaving fire, and with a gesture and pulse of blue light, he yanked two geth troopers out of the brush and smashed them against a tree. He kept them pinned there until a sonic grenade slammed into the pair, blowing them into whipping shards of metal and wiring. Another geth was bisected by an ion cannon blast, and two more in her line of sight were blown apart by a sonic grenade hitting the tree they were crouched behind.

"Alenko!" she ordered. "EW grenades! Disrupt their shields!"

"On it, ma'am," he replied, and his omnitool flared. He pointed his off-hand toward a cluster of geth, and the wrist-mounted launcher loosed a small grenade fabricated by his omnitool into the midst of the synthetics. Blue lightning erupted from the tiny explosive, and the synthetics jerked violently as the bolts of electricity overloaded their sensors and the exposed shield projectors of their armor. Two other Marines opened fire, and the geth went down almost immediately.

Fire suddenly slackened, and then ended from the direction they were assaulting, and a check of her sensors showed Shepard why. In the span of a few seconds, the GDI squad had annihilated one entire flank of ambushers. Trees were still toppling to the forest floor, crashing down on either side of the squad as they advanced, most of the Marines not realizing they'd wiped the enemy out almost wholesale. They ducked back, evading the falling trees and the incoming fire from the other half of the ambush force.

Another massive, blue-white bolt ripped toward them, tearing through a collapsing tree like it was made of aluminum and generating a flare of surging plasma that set the tree ablaze. Shepard glanced at the burning tree, and nodded. It wasn't an energy weapon, but some kind of missile or solid round that generated plasma on impact. Heavy planetary siege ion cannons did something similar.

Through the falling trees and flying leaves, Shepard saw the remaining geth advancing, their fire intensifying. The air was filled with a constant stream of pulsing blue gunfire, and then a line of deeper, heavier gunfire roared in toward them, tearing a tree in half. One of lighter-armored Marines jerked and flew backwards as the wave of heavy gunfire swept over him, gaping holes torn out of his chest and faceplate.

The armature smashed through the underbrush, heavy mass accelerator cannons around its head blazing. It was enormous, twice the height of a human, a quadrupedal machine with the serpentine geth head set above a crab-like lower body. Its head swiveled toward the GDI squad as they spread out again, and fired another rippling blue-white pulse at one of the Zone Marines. He engaged his jump pack and dove aside, the shot screaming past and detonating against another tree trunk, bringing that one crashing down as well.

"Team One," Shepard ordered, addressing the Zone Marines. "Suppress. Team Two and Three, maneuver on their flanks. Alenko, with me." The jamming was cutting down on her radio's range, but she pumped enough power into the transmitter that it could be heard within a hundred meters.

She broke to the side, triggering a quick jump that carried her behind a particularly large tree. A second later, Kaidan landed beside her. Like Shepard, his armor had an embedded VI interface that linked up to his implant, turning the entire suit into one large biotic amplifier.

"Commander?" he asked as he crouched beside her.

"That big walker," she ordered. "We're going to kill it with our brains."

"Understood, ma'am," the Lieutenant replied. "We'll need to be a bit closer."

"Right," she said, nodding. "Collapsed tree, twenty meters."

"I see it," he replied, noting a tree that had fallen in the chaos of the initial ambush, which was a relatively short distance away from the walker.

"I'll cover, move up," Shepard said.

He nodded, waited until she had leaned out with her weapon, and dashed out of cover. She held her fire to keep from drawing attention to Kaidan, and instead watched the heavy geth walker as it lumbered across the rough terrain. It moved slowly, but the blasts it fired every couple of seconds were immensely powerful. The GDI squad had fanned out, mostly dodging the walker's fire while trading shots with the geth infantry. She watched as the squad maneuvered to try to keep the geth infantry between themselves and the walker, which was working well to disrupt the incoming fire. The Zone Marines were using the integrated heavy weapons in their Werewolves to keep the geth suppressed and focused on them while the lighter-armored Marine riflemen maneuvered on the flanks to get around the synthetics' cover.

Kaidan reached the cover of the fallen tree trunk without being fired upon, and Shepard followed suit. He covered her as she ran, holding fire as she had. She slid into cover beside him, the walker no more than sixty meters away – now well within range of accurate biotics. Short range was one of the major weaknesses of biotic powers, requiring their users to get close for greatest effect.

"On my mark, grab and lift," she ordered. "Then you hammer it with an ECM, I'll warp, and then we both blast it apart." He nodded. "Mark!"

Both biotics rose, focused, and altered the gravity around the geth walker. By themselves, it would have been a lot harder to pull off, but one of them could have lifted the synthetic weapons platform. Together, they managed to grab it and heft it into the air, yanking the machine off the dirt and suspending it several meters above the ground. Kaidan's omnitool fired again, sending another overloading grenade at the armature. As electricity surged around the armature and disrupted its shields, Shepard released her own field and and sent out a second pulse of altered gravity, this time in the form of a disruptive surge of twisting ripping, disruptive gravity fields. It impacted with the two biotic fields surrounding the walker, and the entire field exploded, creating a savage, brutal barrage of ripping, distorted gravity fields. Armor was torn free of the armature and one of its legs bowed and twisted. It tumbled to the ground with a terrible crash of bruised ceramics and metal.

"Open fire!" she barked, raising her Werewolf and triggering her grenade launcher. The sonic grenade slammed into the walker's armor and exploded, blowing chunks out of the plating, and both Kaidan and Shepard cut loose with their weapons'' mass accelerators.

Both weapons sprayed hypervelocity rounds at the prone walker, pounding through the weakened armor, and they advanced to get a better firing position. Their Werewolves howled in their ears as they kept firing, watching holes explode and spark in the machine's hide as it tried to rise. For all the bullets they were pumping into it, the walker was still fighting, and it clambered to its feet, making a deep hissing and warbling sound.

The walker pivoted toward them, fixing the pair with its glowing flashlight "eye." Shepard switched modules and triggered another grenade, this one exploding against its torso. Armor blew apart, and the machine staggered sideways – but it was still standing, and its head began to glow as it prepared another shot. Kaidan pumped his arm, and biotic thrust slammed into the machine's head, knocking it sideways again. Unlike an organic, which would be staggered and disoriented, the walker whirled back toward them instantly, stubbornly intent on firing.

An armor-piercing round smashed through its head. A second later, Shepard fired another grenade, detonating beside the rent she'd blasted in the armor a moment before. Two blue ion streams smashed into the walker's side and rear, boiling through armor, and more gunfire poured into the walker from all sides.

The rest of the GDI squad had finished the remaining geth infantry, and tore into the armature like a pack of wolves. The machine collapsed a few moments later, dropping to the dirt and going still, lights dimming.

* * *

They spent five minutes counting their losses. It was all they had time for.

"Davis, Griffon, and Akemi are dead," Kaidan reported, tone quiet. Shepard nodded, watching silently as two of the squad stripped the fallen of their portable gear. There was no sense in letting their supplies and ammo go to waste.

One Zone Trooper and two Marine riflemen dead on their first engagement on this mission. Admittedly, they had taken down three times their number of unknown enemy after surviving their ambush, but those losses were still unacceptable. Their deaths were due to her errors.

"Should have been watching for an ambush," she muttered, but that was all the self-recrimination she had time for.

"Leave the dead, and put down a marker," she barked. "We don't have time to do anything else."

The squad's survivors nodded. Thirty seconds later, they were moving again, bounding through the trees toward the dig site.

Shepard would take the time to remember the dead after she'd avenged them in enemy blood. In the meantime, they had a beacon to acquire.

* * *

_**Codex - Technology - Weapons: Shapeshifter**_

_The advent of mass effect technology allowed for the creation of lighter, smaller, and more compact weapons systems. A mass accelerator weapon could be up to fifty percent lighter than a chemical-powered slugthrower, without factoring in reduced ammunition weights. This allowed for the development of compact weapons that "fold out" into larger, more easily-wielded forms. Modern mass accelerators can be easily collapsed into forms the size of large books or handbags, or in the case of some small handguns, potentially down to the size of a deck of playing cards, allowing for easy and covert transport._

_The Global Defense Initiative's weapons designers went in the exact opposite direction; since mass accelerators were so much lighter, they reasoned, a standard firearm's frame could support more weaponry. This design philosophy led to weapons laboratory Monoc Securities' development of the "Shapeshifter" brand of weapons - a line of modular firearms that incorporated several different types of weapons into a single frame, which can rapidly "shift" between different firearms. The basis of this design came from experimental technology developed after the Third Tiberium War, which was eventually developed into a limited-run weapon known as the GD-10. However, the GD-10 was scrapped due to unfeasibility of the product, with officials stating the final product "did not meet quality standards." It was not until mass effect technology and mass accelerators were discovered that the "shifter" technology became compact enough that it could be fitted into a frame small enough for unaugmented infantry to carry._

_These weapons performed well enough in tests that GDI adopted several variants of the "Werewolf" model as standard issue weapons for infantry. Standard weapons mount either an assault rifle, battle rifle, or submachinegun configuration as the primary weapon, with attached shotgun, sniper rifle, or squad support machinegun add-ons. Additional add-ons include grenade or rocket-propelled grenade launchers, armor-piercing railguns, guided missile launchers, lightweight ion cannons, flamethrowers, sonic projectors, heavy machineguns, and other, more exotic attachments. These firing modes can quickly be adjusted at the press of a button, and it typically takes only a second or two in order to switch to the alternate weapon. Extensive ruggedization by Monoc Securities ensures that the Werewolf is highly reliable and has as few moving parts as possible, reducing the likelihood that damage will render the weapon inoperable. In extreme cases, the weapon modules can be physically removed from the main weapon's casing and utilized independently. Heavier models are commonly used by Zone-armored soldiers, and consequently mount either a greater number or more powerful weapons modules._

_There are disadvantages to using Shapeshifter weaponry, foremost among them that they sacrifice power for versatility; a dedicated heavy weapon, such as a surface-to-air missile launcher for example, would be better at its job than a Shapeshifter weapon module. A full-sized weapon would have dedicated sensor suites, larger missiles, and more fuel, giving it greater range and firepower. Another disadvantage is that Shapeshifter weapons are expensive; the user is typically paying for a number of different, individual weapons over a single device._

_The Werewolf proved popular with GDI troops due to its combined versatility and reliability, a fact that was not lost to the rest of the galaxy. Though Monoc Securities sells the Werewolf and other Shapeshifter weapons primarily to GDI, mercenary groups within the Terminus Systems and Citadel space have been encountered armed with these multipurpose weapons. However, expense and availability limit the sale of Shapeshifter weaponry to Citadel militaries._

* * *

**_Author's Notes: _**For visualization purposes, the GDI Marines' armor resembles the RAID armor worn by GDI in the canceled _Tiberium_ game. The Coyote is based off the Hunter tank from _Tiberium Twilight._


	4. Chapter 4: Archive

_**Chapter 4: Archive**_

At one point, it had been human.

Now, it was a pulsing, humanoid mass of electrical blue circuitry and desiccated flesh. It had torn itself off one of the thirty or so spikes lining the campsite's perimeter, let loose a brassy scream, and bounded at the small group of survivors on the hilltop. Glowing blue implants shone in empty eye sockets as it plodded toward the hulking, humpbacked form of a krogan warrior, clad in blocky, GDI-designed and krogan-adapted armor. The massive alien kept pumping burst after burst from his heavy Werewolf rifle into the thing's stubborn shields. Blue bolts lanced past the krogan, fired from the cannon that had replaced its left forearm, but he kept his cool as he focused on his target.

The alien warrior rumbled quietly, a noise of annoyance as he kept up the fire. His name was Wrex, of Clan Urdnot, and he was supposed to be working a low-risk security contract on a reasonably quiet human world, engaging in boring but lucrative downtime while protecting the dig site. He'd been worried there would be nothing to actually defend against.

He was very wrong, much to his joy.

There was a hiss of metal sliding through and against withered flesh, and as the corpse-husk surged forward, its right hand and fingers became a quartet of long glittering metal blades. _That _was something new, but it didn't make Wrex blanch in the slightest. He sighted the walking corpse and put three rapid bursts through its head as it hobbled forward. The first two hammered its shields, but the last volley tore its head apart.

He counted maybe twenty of the husks, roughly half of them possessing long claws erupting from their forearms. The rest had hefty bulges on their forearms that ended with large barrels. One of them leveled its arm-cannon at the krogan, and another blue-white bolt of charged particles ripped toward him. He dropped behind the half-destroyed trailer wall he was taking cover behind, and the blast shook the barricade.

Wrex's eyes flicked back and forth, and he noted the two Zone Marines on either side of him, the only other survivors in their group. Naturally, they were letting the krogan hold the center of the line. Hell, he'd volunteered. Their Werewolves were roaring a steady cadence of controlled fire, intermixed with railgun and sonic grenade rounds as the tide of cybernetically resurrected corpses kept swarming up toward them. They'd taken up a position outside the ruins, on the hill where the scientists who'd been studying the ruins were camped.

Those scientists were dead, along with the rest of the security detail, and their bodies had since been converted into these cybernetic husks well before the fireteam had fallen back here.

Now they were fighting for their lives as the corpses as they swarmed around the trailers, which had been gutted by overhead fire early in the assault. Wrex shot through the main windows and doors in the center, deflecting enemy fire with high-powered personal shields, heavy armor, and krogan hyper-redundant biology, while the humans took the flanks. In their Zone armor, they were imposing figures, even to a massive slab of muscle like Wrex. Some krogan would have mocked the humans for wearing such heavy suits of powered armor, but Wrex understood the idiocy of that kind of bravado. If it made a warrior kill more effectively, it was _always_ a good idea.

"Three, east side," called Gunnery Chief Williams, on his right. The Zone Marine pivoted and hosed three of the husks that were flanking around the trailers. She pumped several bursts of mass accelerator rounds into the lead husk, and then triggered her grenade launcher. A sonic grenade tore the first husk apart, sending withered gray flesh and blue cybernetic hurtling away, and floored the other two. Quick bursts finished off the clawed husks.

On his left, he saw one of the husks suddenly hauled off its feet and hurled into another, knocking them both over. A grenade slammed into the husks, shredding them. That would be Lieutenant Taylor, the nominal leader of their little group. Wrex technically didn't outrank them, being a "civilian," and he didn't bother challenging the established authority despite the fact that he was about fifteen times Taylor's age. They were in a crisis, and he knew better than to contest leadership when zombies with cybernetic cannons and half-meter-long armblades were attacking.

The husks kept charging, a mindless wave of claws and blue lightning, and the trio kept pushing them back. Chunks of their cover vanished as the "shooter" husks pounded away, blasting grapefruit-sized holes in the trailer walls as they lurched forward.

The sensor display lit up suddenly, and a dozen friendly contacts appeared south of their position.

"This is callsign Raptor Two-One," Jacob called into his radio, having spotted the incoming contacts. "Please verify."

"_Two-One, this is Normandy Ground Team Actual,"_a female's voice replied. _"Be advised, no day code. We're fresh to the field."_

"Copy that," Jacob replied. "We could use some support."

"_Acknowledged. We're incoming on your position."_

A heartbeat later, there was a storm of incoming railgun rounds and grenades, hammering the back of the husk force. Bodies were hurled away in dozens of pieces, while others were sliced apart or toppled to the ground with gaping holes in their torsos and stomachs.

A line of GDI troops dropped down onto the hilltop, their jetpacks flaring with counterthrust as they hit. They advanced in a disciplined firing line, Zone Troopers alternating with lighter Marines. Their weapons roared and thundered, their Werewolves tearing into the husks with and discipline and control.

Several of the husks managed to turn to face the sudden assault, but were blown apart by railgun shots or snatched into the air by biotics, suspended until they could be blown apart.

Within seconds, the hilltop was clear, and the Marines emerged from cover. A few seconds later, they were face-to-face with their backup, or at least as face-to-face as they could be when everyone was wearing face-concealing helmets.

The leader of the newcomers was a female human, though Wrex could only tell because she was slightly shorter and more slender than the others; the armor plating made it otherwise impossible to tell gender on the species. They weren't like the asari, who insisted on having form-fitting armor. Taylor stepped toward her, and his torso shifted forward, as if he was nodding to her.

"Commander," the lieutenant said. "Good to see some reinforcements, it was getting tight there for a moment. Lieutenant Jacob Taylor, 212th Marines."

"Lieutenant Commander Shepard, _GDS Normandy_," the officer replied. Wrex noted the stronger element zero mass of her armor on his sensors. A biotic. "We got the distress call. What happened down here?"

"Geth," Taylor replied. "At least, that's what they look to be. Hard to believe." He took a short breath. "Our unit was on patrol outside the ruins when the attack came. Didn't have much time to respond. Sirens started when the orbital arrays reported contact with incoming ships. We had maybe ten minutes' warning before they started coming down through the atmosphere."

"Ten minutes?" one of the other humans with the reinforcements whispered. "They tore through the orbitals in only ten minutes?"

"Like I said, we didn't have much warning," Taylor said. "Got just enough time to get the Firestorms up. Then we had geth raining down everywhere, and dropships bombing anything on the ground that didn't have decent AA protecting it."

"What about Scrin?" asked another of the new arrivals, wearing armor much like Shepard's. Another biotic, possibly an officer.

"Only buzzers," Taylor replied.

"What happened to your squad?" Shepard asked.

"Geth hit the ruins, and us," he replied, shrugging. The gesture seemed almost comical on the heavy power-armor. "We got flanked, surrounded, pinned down. Couldn't jet out."

"Then the buzzers hit us," added Williams. "Took out the militia and Marines. It was . . . _bad_."

"We turned the railguns on the buzzers," Taylor said. "Just like in the Third Tib War. Took 'em out. Then we managed to regroup and punch out of the geth perimeter. Lucky for us we met Wrex here, doing security for the dig site. Brought us up here to find the beacon. That's when we were jumped by these . . . things."

The krogan grunted and nodded at the compliment.

"Did you find the beacon?" Shepard asked, to which Taylor grunted. Wrex cut in before he could speak.

"Scientists brought it up here. By the time we got here, those-" he gestured to the husk corpses "-were all that were left of the research team."

"What are they? They look human," Shepard asked, crouching by one of the corpses. "Or they were."

"Human bodies," Williams said. "The geth had them impaled on those spikes. It did something to them, replaced them with cybernetics I think. As soon as we landed, they hauled themselves off the spikes and started shooting or trying to rip us apart. Those guns aren't geth weapons, either. I think they're Scrin."

Shepard seemed to check over the area for a moment. Wrex couldn't read her face, concealed behind the elongated helmet, but he knew the body language of someone with purpose.

"Have you seen anymore Scrin in the area?" Shepard asked after a couple of seconds, clearly filing away what had been done to the corpses for later consideration.

"None," Taylor said. "Nothing resembling anything Scrin on our sensors, just geth and . . . these husks."

"Okay," Shepard said. "Your team is part of ours now. We're here to recover the beacon, using any means necessary. Reinforcements are en route, but we don't know how long until backup can arrive from Arcturus. Until then, we're on point to get that beacon back."

"There's a monorail about two kilometers north," Williams added. "There haven't been any dropships passing over since the initial attack, so if the geth removed the beacon, it would have to be transported that way."

"Got it," Shepard replied, nodding. "If the geth took it to the monorail station, we'll need to move fast." She glanced to Wrex. "That armor have jumpjets?"

"Naturally," the krogan rumbled. He didn't work in GDI space if he didn't have GDI tech.

She nodded, and a few seconds later the GDI Marines were airborne. Wrex followed after them, impressed by the no-nonsense attitude of this human officer. She didn't bother asking him if he wanted to come with her, or even try to draft him into the squad. She understood that a krogan didn't shy from a fight.

His comm buzzed as they moved through the air, and he acknowledged it.

"_Wrex," _Commander Shepard said.

"Here," he replied.

"_You come with us, you follow my orders."_

It wasn't a question, and she didn't leave room for him to disagree. He liked her already.

"Your show, Shepard," he replied, and that was that.

* * *

The monorail station was silent, which meant nothing as far as geth were concerned. Nihlus kept low to the ground, advancing between the spikes rising out of the ground. Human corpses hung from the enormous spikes, doubtless impaled by either the geth or the Scrin.

He wasn't certain of the purpose until he'd paused by one body, checking it with his rifle's scope. He could see cords of machinery that were, for lack of a better word, _growing_ over the corpse's body. There were also bulging shapes on the arms which looked like half-constructed weapons systems.

_Alien technology that is used to convert dead bodies into shock troops,_ Nihlus thought. _Curious. Reprehensible, and perfect for draining morale._

He moved past the spikes, toward the platform itself. While the spikes were disturbing, he'd seen more sadistic and vicious things before, and had put those monsters down just as readily as he intended to eliminate these geth and Scrin. He wasn't going to get emotional about it; after all, blazing wrath and cold vengeance both killed equally well, but the former resulted in one's own death in the process.

Of course, the Council was going to go feral over this. GDI wasn't a member of the Citadel, but an open attack like this was only going to provoke them, and in turn provoke the Council into action. He couldn't begin to guess the political ramifications, especially with the reappearance of alien species that the Council had been dismissive of for decades.

He caught movement up ahead, on the platform. It was just a flat, cleared area of prefabricated metal designed to hold crates from receiving or transport, and was piled high with boxes. Nihlus crouched low, weapon ready, and slowly edged forward up the steps leading onto the platform. He reached the top, and came to a halt, green eyes faintly widening and his mandibles spreading in a turian expression of surprise.

"Saren?" he asked.

On the main platform were about a dozen geth corpses, the synthetics sprawled about and silent. In the middle of the platform he saw another turian, this one with white skin and a face devoid of markings. His crest and spines ran much longer than the turian norm, stretching back from his head. He was clad in a suit of custom-designed body armor, with one half of the hardsuit looking like conventional turian battle plate, but which shifted into an almost organic-looking design on the other half of his body. Cold blue eyes turned to face Nihlus, and he froze in place.

"Nihlus," said Saren Arterius. Turian voices were often described as being metallic, and following that analogy, the other Spectre's tone was like cast iron, rough and harsh.

"What are you doing here?" Nihlus asked, lowering his rifle. Had the Council dispatched another Spectre without telling him? That was actually not that uncommon, but on something this important, they should have at least warned him that another asset was going to be on hand. Especially into neutral territory that only acknowledged a Spectre's authority when said Spectre was accompanied by an armed escort.

The other Spectre had been crouched over one geth corpse, but as Nihlus approached, he rose and started walking toward him. He was holding a heavy, cylindrical case in his off-hand.

"The Council thought you could use some help on this one," Saren said, and as he approached, he put a hand on Nihlus' shoulder. That made him relax a bit; the two had worked well together in the past, and the familiar gesture set Nihlus a bit more at ease.

"The Council didn't warn me you would be in GDI space," Nihlus said. "Turians draw attention out here."

"I agree," Saren replied, walking past him. "But the Council thought it was worth the risks. GDI was not happy about my presence."

"This is bad," Nihlus said, looking up at the skies overhead, and pushing politics to the back of his mind. He could distantly hear mass accelerator fire. "We didn't expect the geth would be here, let alone the Scrin. We have to locate the beacon. My support team is en route."

"Don't worry about the beacon," Saren said from behind him, and Nihlus started to turn. He remembered the case Saren was holding; was that it? Had he found-

Nihlus had turned halfway toward Saren when there was a sudden, intense blast of sound and noise, and pain lanced across his face. Nihlus reacted reflexively, leaping backward and raising his weapon, and everything slowed down enough for him to make out the critical details.

Saren was recoiling, dark blue turian blood streaming down his armor, but he had a pistol in hand – a pistol that had just gone off centimeters from Nihlus' head. A chunk of Saren's armor had been blown off along his forearm. Beyond Saren, the geth bodies were leaping to their feet, weapons in hand.

And overhead, descending toward the monorail platform, were a dozen tan and gray-armored GDI Marines, followed by a krogan.

Nihlus dove for cover, finding a pile of crates and putting it between himself and Saren, his mind racing as he tried to understand what had just happened.

Saren had tried to shoot him. Which meant that Saren was working with the geth and the Scrin.

And that case meant only one thing: Saren had the contents of the Prothean beacon.

"Shepard!" Nihlus yelled over his radio. "Is that you?"

_"This is Normandy Ground Team Actual,"_ Shepard's voice replied as a storm of gunfire ripped down into the platform. _"Nihlus, that you?"_

"Affirmative," he replied as a hurricane of noise and violence ensued. The geth returned fire while the Marines landed around the structure and poured railgun rounds, grenades, and hypervelocity shots into the synthetics.

"The turian on the platform!" Nihlus called. "He has the beacon! Take him out!"

* * *

"Focus fire on the turian!" Shepard ordered as she ducked into cover beside the platform.

_"Which one?"_ Gunnery Chief Williams asked.

"The one shooting at us, dammit!" Shepard clarified.

_"Aye, ma'am,"_ Williams replied.

The gray-armored turian was retreating up the platform, firing his pistol as he went, while the geth kept the majority of the GDI troops occupied. Shepard snatched one geth and hurled it against the platform wall with a biotic thrust, while Kaidan and Lieutenant Taylor suspended two more in the air where they could easily be dispatched. Railguns cracked and grenades exploded, hammering the synthetics under a torrent of brutal firepower.

The geth lacked the raw firepower of the humans, but they made up for it with an eerie coordination and tenacity. They withdrew up onto the platform, keeping a withering storm of pulse fire that kept the GDI Marines from advancing in spite of their heavy weaponry. She saw one of the Zone Marines, PFC Broth, duck for cover behind one of the modular, blocky sheds by the platform, and blood was seeping through a large rent in his armor. Another Marine was sprawled on the grass, alive but unconscious, with blood weeping onto the dirt despite his hardsuit's medical suite; he'd be dead in minutes without medical help.

More importantly, the turian who'd been about to sucker-punch Nihlus was most of the way across the platform, and she knew he was running to the monorail to escape. They didn't have time.

"Alenko," she ordered, and highlighted the wounded Marine, Private Frase. "Medigel and stabilize!" She checked the positions of her troops. Two of them were close enough to the platform that they'd have a decent shot at flanking, with some creative jumpjet maneuvers.

"Williams! Jenkins!" She highlighted the spot where she needed them to maneuver. "Advance to-"

She saw movement at the point she was about to send her troops to, and Shepard went silent. The one member of the group who wasn't a GDI Marine was already there.

Urdnot Wrex dropped down onto the platform, shotgun module activated, and the krogan wasted no time introducing himself. He slammed into one of the slender synthetics with a charging shoulder, sending it sprawling, and jammed his shotgun into another's back, straight through its barriers. The shotgun thundered, blowing the synthetic almost in half at the midsection, and Wrex then stomped hard on the geth he'd knocked prone, crumpling the synthetic's torso.

The surprise attack drew the geth's attention, but they responded swiftly, whirling to fire on Wrex. The sudden assault's purpose had been achieved, however, as the machines' efforts were suddenly divided.

The GDI Marines rose, and within a couple of seconds four more geth were ripped apart, with a fifth lifted and flattened into the platform by a torrent of shifting gravity.

Williams and Jenkins had already been moving when Shepard issued her orders a heartbeat earlier, and had leapt up onto the platform near Wrex, who was busy blowing the limbs off another geth soldier. The two Zone Marines added their fire to the krogan's, and synthetic body parts were sent flying.

Shepard spotted Nihlus, clambering up onto the platform unnoticed in all the chaos. He dropped in behind two more geth, and the synthetics responded immediately, whirling to level their weapons at him. He moved faster, however, dispatching one with a point-blank shot to the torso, while his leg lashed out at the other, kicking out its equivalent of ankles. Before it even hit the platform Nihlus drilled a burst into the synthetic's back, stilling it.

The geth defense collapsed, going from a cohesive force to a brutal rout in seconds, and the GDI troops stormed onto the platform. Shepard saw Nihlus already moving, and Jenkins and Williams were right behind him, all of them dashing to far end of the platform. Shepard chased after them, jump-jetting onto the platform. As she did so, she checked her squad's condition; Kaidan had managed to get to Frase and stabilized him, while Broth was covering them, wounded though he was. There were minor injuries and armor damage to the rest of the squad, but they were otherwise intact.

She heard more gunfire, and saw that Williams, Jenkins, and Wrex were closing in on the marker that indicated the hostile turian's sensor tag. The turian was on the monorail as far as she could tell, with a cluster of about a dozen more geth nearby. As she charged across the platform, Shepard's suit picked up the monorail's eezo core powering up.

"He's starting the train!" Shepard yelled. "Squad, jump aboard and stop him!"

The two Marines and the krogan in the lead responded immediately, their jumppacks firing as they reached the far end of the platform. They went hurtling up into the air over the train toward the front, while the rest of the squad followed suit, desperately trying to get to the train as it pulled out of the station.

* * *

_"Jenkins, on point,"_ Gunnery Chief Williams ordered, and the Corporal moved to obey.

Geth pulse fire ripped through the air toward the trio as they jetted after the departing monorail. Corporal Richard L. Jenkins counted nearly two dozen geth on the train, mostly the gray-armored soldiers and white-armored shock troops. There were three larger geth, all painted black, and every single synthetic's gleaming flashlight-head swiveled up toward the trio as they descended.

Pulse fire hammered off their shields, and the two humans and the krogan returned fire. The computers tried to correct their wildly inaccurate fire as they descended, and Jenkins saw at least one geth soldier drop, but he couldn't tell whether it was the krogan or the Gunnery Chief who got that kill.

Then Jenkins spotted a bit of movement from the head of the train as they descended, and the gray-clad turian they were pursuing snapped an arm up toward them. He saw the flash of an arm-mounted omnitool.

Jenkins' displays exploded with flashes of static and junk data, and his suit's jumpjets cut out. The world spun around wildly as the ECM blast the turian had fired cut out all of his electronics, and he went tumbling end over end. The displays flickered as he fell, and came back online right as he hit something hard enough to send stars flashing over his vision.

Pure instinct and the warbling of nearby geth sent him scrambling to his feet, while extensive training told Jenkins he was lying on his back, and thus told him _how_ to get to his feet. He rose swiftly enough to take only a dozen pulse fire shots to the torso of his Zone Armor, which exploded against his shields and sent them into the red.

Jenkins' displays were online, and told him that he had landed at the head of the train; Gunnery Chief Williams and Wrex had landed further back - likely taking a direct hit from the ECM blast, he guessed.

That thought flickered through his head, along with a clinical, detached observation that there were seven geth that were all either firing at him or raising their weapons to do so. That thought sent a surge of giddy near-panic through Jenkins as he scrambled to his feet. Most of the hostiles were directly in front of him, between Jenkins and the front of the train, where the turian with the whatever-it-was stood; six of them were human-sized and one was the heavily-armored black-painted type.

"Well, shit," he muttered, without really thinking about it.

Pulse rounds slammed into his shields, and Jenkins triggered the backup capacitors in his suit, pumping fresh power into the barriers as they collapsed. They pulsed back to life long enough for him to raise his Werewolf and cut loose with a point-blank barrage into the nearest geth trooper's torso. The stream of rounds tore through the synthetic's shields and ripped through its torso, and he scrambled sideways while firing to get another geth between him and its fellows.

That geth smoothly dropped to its knees, and the others fired over it, hammering the Zone Marine's barriers down to the red again. Jenkins poured fire into another of the alien machines, disabling it, and changed his direction while shooting. He rushed straight into the kneeling geth and kicked it with one of his suit's oversized legs. The mechanical boot went straight through the geth's shields and smashed its flashbulb head in.

Pulse rounds slammed through his shields and hammered his armor. A spike of pain lanced through Jenkins' gut, and he realized he couldn't take down this many geth. He'd only killed three of the seven synthetics, and his shields were down and armor was failing.

A wild, desperate idea hit Jenkins, and before he could think about it, he triggered his jump pack and angled it toward the enemy.

The pack had only recharged to thirty percent, but that was enough to send him hurtling into the two closest geth with enough force to bowl them over - and in one case, knock one completely off the side of the train. He hurtled forward toward the last human-sized geth, and was a heartbeat from impact when a flat, glowing, hexagonal barrier appeared in front of it.

Jenkins slammed into it and the mass effect barrier collapsed, but not before jerking the human Marine to a halt. He bounced off and hit the deck, and swung his Werewolf up in a wild, drunken sweep that clipped the geth's weapon. The synthetic was knocked sideways, and Jenkins scrambled to his feet. He shoved the Werewolf inside the geth's shields and fired before it could recover.

The machine flew apart, and then Jenkins was knocked flat on his ass as the black, hulking geth crashed into him. The thing had more mass than Jenkins' Zone armor and a hell of a lot of power behind its charge, and the geth jabbed its weapon down at his faceplate. He rolled as it fired, and Jenkins' shoulder erupted in agony as rounds tore through it.

He bit back the pain and kicked out with one leg, hitting the heavy geth soldier and unbalancing it before it could fire again. He rose drunkenly and swung his Werewolf at the heavy geth trooper, but the blow did little more than make the machine take a step backward.

That was all Jenkins needed, as he triggered his Werewolf's railgun attachment. The long weapon extended from the top of the heavy rifle, and he swung it up into the geth's chest as it recovered from the impact. He squeezed the trigger as they collided.

There was an incredible pulse of noise and recoil, and the geth flew apart into a dozen sparking pieces, spraying white mechanical fluid everywhere.

The pain in Jenkins' shoulder began to fade as his onboard medigel injectors pumped into his wounds. His suit's diagnostics told him that he'd lost the use of his left arm, one jumpjet was damaged, and he'd been hit in multiple locations across his stomach and torso.

But he could still fight, and the turian was right in front of him, not twenty meters away, distracted with the control console for the monorail. He strode toward the alien as best he could, which made it into a drunken stumble, but his Werewolf rose to his shoulder and the suit's arm locked in place, giving him a steady line of fire.

The turian glanced over his shoulder as Jenkins raised the weapon, and the alien's omnitool flashed again. Jenkins saw the flicker of light, and pulled the trigger, only to have the Werewolf suddenly howl with an overheat alarm. A moment later, the turian's omnitool flickered again, and he turned to one of the crates beside him. He pressed a button on the side, and the lid rose.

Jenkins cursed furiously, switching weapon modes, but all of his Werewolf's modules kept flashing the false overheat alarm and were going through the cooldown cycle. Long, terrifying seconds passed as he tried to reset the weapon's temperature sensors.

The sensors flickered and reset, and he raised the weapon again, in time to see the crate open, and a river of flickering silver threads rippled out into the air. Jenkins swiveled to target the cloud of expanding, bladed . . . _things_ as they seemed to turn toward him.

The buzzers suddenly stopped moving for a heartbeat, which meant they stopped keeping pace with the train. The monorail carried Jenkins straight forward into the cloud of tiny bladed creatures, and they found the seams and holes and gaps almost instantly. They flowed through the air intakes and through the bullet holes, they sliced holes in the flexible material covering his joints, and slithered into the tiniest cracks.

Pain erupted along Jenkins' body as ten thousand tiny, thread-like razorblades ran across his skin, into his body, slicing apart muscle and bone and blood vessels. He tried to scream, but blood erupted from his mouth and nostrils and flooded into his lungs. His weapon fired wildly into the air for the few moments his arm remained attached to his body.

It ended a merciful moment later, when the buzzers found his brain and surgically sliced it apart, ending all consciousness. Jenkins' armor crumpled to the floor, weeping blood from a dozen rents and holes.

As his body fell, Saren Arterius went back to the controls for the monorail, and finally got past the security systems that were keeping him from detaching the rear cars. There was a clank and a deep shudder, and all of the cars save the lead detached.

Saren pulled ahead and left the GDI troops in his wake, the buzzers curling around him in a protective cocoon.

* * *

The remaining geth troops on the train matched the GDI forces in numbers, but not raw firepower. Between Shepard, Nihlus, and the GDI Marines, they had boarded and swept the remaining geth off the monorail from the rear cars forward in a storm of mass accelerator fire, grenades, and biotic brutality.

"_Normandy_, this is Shepard," the Commander called as they advanced to the front of the monorail, and spotted the turian escaping. "Come in _Normandy_."

_"_Normandy_ here, Commander," _Anderson's voice replied. _"What's happened?"_

"We've confirmed geth and Scrin presence on the ground," Shepard reported. "There's an unidentified turian working with them. We think he has the beacon. He's en route to a spaceport a few kilometers from the dig site. Sending coordinates now."

_"Understood. I'll try to get some backup to you, Commander."_

"Be appreciated," she replied.

After closing the link, Shepard went to check on her team. Williams and Wrex had both been with Jenkins when he'd gone after the turian, but the ECM blast that had scrambled their suits sent them crashing further back than Jenkins. They were uninjured, but if Jenkins hadn't wiped out the nearest geth in the few seconds they'd needed to recover, things could have ended up a lot worse.

As it was, they were losing ground. The monorail was still moving, but the lead car was moving a lot faster; they would be several minutes behind the turian once they reached the station.

She stepped over to Jenkins' corpse and crouched beside it. Shepard had barely known the man, beyond that he was a native to Eden Prime. Now he was another name added to the list of the men and women who had never made it home under her command. She peered over his corpse, and saw the unrecognizable mass of blood and mutilated flesh through his suit's faceplate, characteristic of a weapon that had resulted in hundreds of dead on Akuze and left the livid scars stretching across her face.

Shepard's hands started shaking, so she accessed her hardsuit's medical suite and injected a small boost of combat stims to steady her nerves.

Movement markers flashed on her HUD, as someone stepped close behind her and didn't have GDI IFF codes. The krogan had codes, which meant it could only be one person.

"Nihlus," she said, not looking up. "Who was that turian?"

"A Spectre," Nihlus replied. "A Spectre who was a friend of mine before he tried to shoot me in the back."

"A Council Spectre?" she asked, looking up and not hiding the shock in her voice.

"Saren Arterius," Nihlus said. The alien's metallic voice was tinged with clear anger, turning it into a low, grating snarl. "I don't know what he's doing here, or why he's working with the geth or the Scrin, but I intend to ask him personally."

Shepard nodded, checking her GPS and the location of the spaceport.

"You'll have plenty of time in a moment," she said, standing up. "We're about two minutes out from the spaceport. Get ready."

* * *

The monorail station rose up on either side of the tram as it slid into the station; on the left was a platform for storing crates brought to the spaceport, while on the right was a long line of cranes to load cargo. A high wall separated the left side of the monorail station from the spaceport, and overhead, less than a kilometer away, loomed the massive specter of the enormous dreadnought that had brought the geth and Scrin to this world. Red lightning crackled along the length of its black hull, and this close Shepard could feel a pressure in the back of her mind, against her implants and tingling through her body from the vessel's mass effect drive.

She had expected coordinated crossfire from overhead, as both platforms provided ample cover and an elevated position to shoot down at the unshielded monorail. Instead, the squad was greeted with silence.

Shepard split the team as they disembarked, sending Taylor, Wrex, and Williams with half the squad up to the left side while she took Alenko and the other half and swept the right. They ascended up to the platform, and she noticed Nihlus following the left-side squad.

"I'm going to recon the other side of this blast wall," Nihlus said, as if reading her thoughts.

He ran straight toward the wall, and leapt up. There was a sudden pulse of blue light around Nihlus' forearms and ankles, and Shepard recognized the appearance of a mass effect clamp like the kinds used to lock ships in place at spaceports - except these were around Nihlus' wrists and feet.

The Spectre then started climbing up the wall, using the mass effect fields to anchor him to the metal.

"I'm going to have to get me one of those," Kaidan murmured.

"Need backup?" Shepard asked Nihlus as he climbed up the walls.

"No, it'll just draw attention," he replied.

"Because running off on his own sure helped him last time," Wrex commented over the radio.

Nihlus disappeared over the wall, and the GDI troops went back to sweeping the platforms. A couple of moments later, they realized that there was nothing there; no ambush, no waiting geth or Scrin troops, nothing.

That was the unsettling part. They knew Saren was here - his monorail car had stopped just ahead of theirs - but there was no sign of a rear guard.

"Squad, form up and get ready to enter the loading dock," she ordered - or rather, started to order, as her words were cut off by a sudden pulse of silver light and a wash of static that shorted out her HUD for a heartbeat. The light bathed the far platform, centered on the wide gap in the wall between the monorail station and the docking port.

When the light faded an instant later, two hulking, bulbous forms loomed in the gateway, looking like enormous beetles built out of metal and crystal and the size of a Coyote APC. They had massive thorax-like bodies, six long spindly legs of gleaming black crystal and metal, and long black cannons as long as a Zone Marine was tall protruding from their bodies where their heads would have been on an actual insect. At their feet were a half-dozen quadruped creatures of blue-gray metal and crystal with tall, swollen, humpbacked upper bodies and a vertical trio of white, glowing lights in the middle of the small bulb-like growth that passed for their head.

The creatures oriented toward the GDI soldiers, and the Scrin Shock Troopers and their Gun Walker support opened fire, filling the monorail station transforming with a storm of silver bolts and blue-white spears of killing energy.

Nihlus heard the sudden firestorm erupt on the other side of the wall, and paused for a heartbeat.

Saren was ahead. He could see his former friend's element zero signature on his suit's sensors. Shepard, meanwhile, was behind him and caught in a hellish firestorm as new contacts appeared on his sensors.

The decision as to what to do was calm, cold, and all too easy.

He dropped down onto the dock and advanced, weapon shouldered, hunting.

If Saren escaped, this would all be for naught.

Bolts of plasma and energy tore into the cranes on the right side of the station, ripping torso-sized hunks of metal out of their cover. Debris and shrapnel caromed off the walls. One of the Zone Marines was bisected at the waist by one of the walkers' beams, the shot punching through his armor like it was paper. Shepard hit the floor behind one of the cranes as the Scrin sent a hideous, withering storm of raw destruction into their position.

"_Normandy_!" Shepard yelled. "We've encountered Scrin on the loading docks! We are taking heavy fire and need air support now!"

_"Support en route. Hold on, Commander," _Anderson's annoyingly calm voice replied. Shepard cursed violently, hoped he heard that, and switched back to squad frequencies.

"Taylor!" Shepard yelled over the radio. "We're pinned down! Can you disrupt them?"

_"Yes ma'am,"_ the Zone Marine replied.

* * *

Across the station, Jacob's squad hadn't been fired upon yet. The Scrin had teleported in and immediately oriented on Shepard's team, and all eight of the . . . well, Jacob didn't know whether they were machines or living creatures or cyborgs or whatever, but all eight of them were focused exclusively on Shepard's team. Jacob sent orders to his squad as they hugged cover, and as one, they rose.

Railguns and grenades thundered, followed by a storm of mass accelerator fire. Jacob picked one of the Shock Troopers and focused on it, sending a pulse of biotic power through his limbs and around the alien, grabbing it in a telekinetic hold and yanking it up off its feet.

Another Shock Trooper wilted under the barrage, three railgun rounds punching clean through its upper body and splattering blue and gray fluid everywhere. A third was hurled off its feet by sonic grenades, and the one Jacob had lifted was shredded by concentrated mass accelerator fire.

The nearest Walker spun the instant they started shooting, and shrugged off two direct railgun hits as it spat a swift barrage of lethal blue-white beams. One of the beams tore off a Marine's arm, and the rest of the GDI troops ducked for cover. Jacob shifted his stance and frantically focused his biotics to generate a barrier around him as he dropped behind cover.

The walker's beam punched through the wall he was crouching behind and hit his barrier dead center, blowing it apart and hurling him off his feet. Scalding heat surged through his body as the beams' leftover energy washed over him, and he howled with pain.

Then a dark blue ball of raw gravitic force hit the Gun Walker in the "head", and made it take a step backward, disrupting its fire. A moment later, Urdnot Wrex sent another pulse of biotic force out, this time unleashing a warping field against one of the larger crates' straps which secured it to the platform. He stepped forward and with a grunt, grabbed the enormous crate and shoved it with all of his alien strength. The straps snapped, and the crate slid sideways to block the walker's incoming fire for a few precious moments.

Gunnery Chief Williams leapt up and took one side of the heavy crate, while Wrex took the other, and they shifted it to better protect the squad from the Walker. Its beams slammed into and gouged deep holes in the metal plating on the other side, and the Marine and the krogan began firing around it at the Scrin war machine.

Taylor's squad had taken a savage beating under only a few seconds' worth of gunfire, but they'd bought Shepard enough of a disruption that she could get what was left of her team organized and returning fire. The remaining Shock Troopers were behind cover now, only exposing the tops of their bodies where their plasma launchers were mounted inside the bulbous upper bodies, and the remaining Gun Walker was stubbornly taking hits from the light railgun rounds and grenades the GDI troops were hurling across the gap. The aliens' return fire, meanwhile, was tearing enormous chunks out of their cover, and within a few seconds one of the cranes let out a scream of tormented metal before toppling over and falling into the monorail trench, leaving the troops behind it exposed.

If they didn't act soon, there wouldn't be much left to hide behind.

* * *

Nihlus passed by what was left of the dockworkers; a dozen bodies impaled on a trio of those monstrous metal spikes. He moved beyond them, using that image to remind him of what he was really after here.

He stepped out onto the main dock, a U-shaped metal platform that was designed to receive incoming freighters. It was wide open, with almost no obstructions, and he could see the enormous dreadnought in full with that unimpeded view. The vast thing was towering overhead, clutching the ground with those titanic, finger-like tendrils. The ground around where it had landed was rippled and cracked, glowing and molten. The sheer scale and presence of the warship was incredible.

On the far end of the docking platform, however, was his concern.

Saren was standing over a computer terminal, fingers jabbing at the device's haptic interface. A cloud of tiny, buzzing insect-like creatures flowed around him like a whirlpool of bladed threads. The case he was carrying was set on a pedestal beside the terminal, and as Nihlus watched, the Spectre reached down and opened the case.

Nihlus froze, crouching, and waited for confirmation.

Saren reached into the case and drew out a gleaming, blue-white ball of swirling, intense light. Even at this distance, Nihlus could make out tiny characters playing across the device's surface, thousands of grain-sized characters, trailed by millions of even tinier symbols, and streams of countless deeper, blurring bits of data beneath. It was a beautiful, impossibly complex display of data.

The beacon had been a lie, of course. Shepard didn't know what they'd really found down there, and now Nihlus had an opportunity to make sure that they never found out. This secret would stay limited to the GDI brass and the Council.

Saren set the device into a circular socket next to the terminal's haptic display, and the swirling light instantly began to slow down. His fingers played over the interface, and after a few moments all motion within the sphere came to a halt.

Then Nihlus shot Saren in the head.

It didn't actually hit flesh, as the round deflected of Saren's barriers, but the Spectre's head snapped up and the buzzer cloud around him swirled faster and more violently in response to the intrusion.

"Nihlus," he said, tone faintly surprised.

"Saren," Nihlus hissed back, rifle leveled. "Why?" the Spectre asked his old friend, and the gray-skinned turian's mandibles widened in a gesture of angry annoyance. "Why the treachery?"

"You wouldn't understand, Nihlus," Saren replied, taking a step away from the terminal.

"I've lost count of how many dead men have said that to me, Saren," Nihlus replied, his words cold and calm.

"True," Saren conceded. "As have I."

He paused, glancing to the terminal, and his blue eyes locked back onto Nihlus'.

"I wonder," Saren said, "what would have happened if you had been the one to discover the truth before me. We're not so different really. We both make the same choices and the same decisions, and have made the same sacrifices."

"I'm not a traitor, Saren," Nihlus bit back.

"Indeed," Saren murmured. "Which is a pity."

Nihlus stared into his old friend's eyes, not ten meters away, and gauged what emotion lay in there.

Which was to say, nothing. No regret, no remorse, no anger or even disappointment. There was nothing there but cold, rational brutality.

Nihlus made up his mind, and pulled the trigger.

At the same instant, the buzzers surrounding Saren leapt away from him and swarmed toward the other Spectre.

Saren spun and bolted toward the terminal as Nihlus snapped a hand down to his waist and snatched up an incendiary grenade. He flung the disk-like explosive at the buzzers as they billowed toward him. The explosive swept into the middle of the swarm and he detonated the grenade, sending a blinding flash of heat and shrapnel in all directions.

The buzzers were lethal but had next to no mass. The heat from the grenade incinerated most of the swarm outright, and the remaining buzzers twisted about, blind and confused. Nihlus remembered Shepard's advice about the buzzers' group consciousness, and saw the remaining thread-like creatures drop to the deck, writhing and twitching before going still.

Nihlus spun on Saren as the other turian reached the terminal and snatched up the globe. Gunfire swept over Saren, hammering his shields, and he spun around to cradle the globe protectively with one arm while snapping up his pistol with the other.

Nihlus kept firing, drilling rounds into Saren's shields and ignoring the ones skipping off his, wholly focused on killing the traitor. Nihlus' off hand dipped to his waist and snatched up another grenade, and he hurled it at Saren. The traitor's eyes widened as he saw the incoming grenade, and he dove sideways as it hurtled toward him.

The grenade detonated, and the blast wave hit Saren in mid-leap. His barriers flashed, but Saren was still an airborne physical object and the law of physics still applied; he was tossed sideways by the blast wave and hit the floor of the dock hard.

The blue-white globe slipped out of his hand and went rolling across the dock toward Nihlus, and he sidestepped toward it, reaching for the relic.

"No!" Saren suddenly snarled, and the traitor's pistol barked. For an instant, Nihlus thought Saren was shooting at him, but then he realized Saren was shooting at the globe.

One round hit the floor a few centimeters to the globe's left. Another flew high over the top. A third barely grazed the blue-white sphere.

A fourth hit it dead center, and the solid, spherical light burst into dazzling, flashing illumination and millions of wild characters dancing across its surface. Nihlus dove down and grabbed the globe, shielding it with his body just as Saren had. In response, Saren leapt up to his feet and dashed back toward the terminal. He hit a key on the haptic interface and the whole screen went blood red.

Nihlus heard a grinding sound behind him, and glanced over his shoulder to see the spikes holding the slain workers aloft start to retract, and the desiccated husks that remains came to life, implants flaring a cold, hideous blue.

* * *

"Alenko," Shepard called. "We need to disrupt this fire! See the walker on the right?"

"Yeah," Kaidan replied, peeking out cover for a moment.

"On my mark, we're going to grab it and drop it in the trench."

"Understood," he said. "Ready when you are."

"Okay, on my mark. Mar-"

The universe was inconsiderate, as it apparently chose to explode right when Shepard was about to make her dramatic biotic strike.

It took a moment for everyone to realize the universe hadn't actually exploded, but rather just a small area around where the Scrin were positioned, as thirty-odd high explosive rockets screamed down and detonated in the middle of the aliens. Metal shivered and flew apart and metal-crystalline body parted went flying through the air while the reverberations from the explosions were making the GDI infantry struggle to stay standing.

A moment later, the roar of engines filled the air, and a pair of sleek yet rounded brown-gray aircraft screamed past twenty meters overhead, the swooping eagle emblem of GDI emblazoned on their turbofan pods.

As the Orca gunships swept overhead, Shepard could see the Scrin forces, or what was left of them. One Gun Walker was intact, while the other stumbled drunkenly sideways, its thorax torn open and weeping some a silvery fluid across the deck. The Shock Troopers were reduced to scattered body parts.

The intact Walker pivoted, raising its head gun as the Orcas flew past, and Shepard knew its tracking systems were good enough to shoot down aircraft. The Orcas were banking to come back around, and the Walker had a perfect shot lined up for them.

"Alenko!" Shepard yelled, and he nodded at her sudden shout. "Mark!"

Both of them focused, and with a swift, exhausting flex of biotic force, Kaidan and Shepard wrapped subjective gravity around the walker. Reality twisted around the gun walker, and the Scrin weapons platform suddenly jerked up into the air, suspended ten meters above the platform.

The Orcas came back around, slowed, and their chin mass accelerators and rocket pods opened up. The walker was consumed in a storm of explosive fury and whipping shards of metal. Chunks of the Scrin weapon tumbled down amid splatters of silver fluids and goop.

The last Walker was in no shape to fight back, but Shepard and her squad made sure of it as they advanced, hosing the stumbling weapon with grenades and heavy weapons fire until it lay still. Shepard took point as they rushed into the docking area beyond, and she noted grimly that only a few of the Marines were still standing. Medical reported two more KIA and the rest wounded; Jacob was unconscious due to suit damage.

The first thing that greeted Shepard as she hurried onto the dock was the sound of frenzied gunfire, followed by the choking howl of another husks. She ran down the ramp leading to the dock's main floor, and caught sight of who was shooting.

Nihlus was backing away from and firing at one of the husks, which was charging at him with long, bladed fingers. Shepard could see dark blue blood running down rents in his armor, and two more husks lay dead on the dock floor, blown apart. He was moving with an obvious limp, holding his rifle in one hand while clutching a glittering blue-white orb of some kind in his other.

The husk pursuing him leapt forward, and Nihlus' rifle tore apart one of the husk's arms, blowing out meat and cybernetics. The other arm lashed out, and three bladed claws sunk into his armor and passed through, digging deep into his flank. He snarled in sudden pain, and the orb tumbled out of his hand.

"Nihlus!" Shepard yelled, shouldering her rifle. A biotic blast that close could hit Nihlus too, so instead she drilled three rapid bursts into the husk's back, blowing out its chest and stomach. It stumbled sideways, wheezed, and collapsed in a boneless pile.

Shepard was dashing toward Nihlus as he sank to one knee, gasping and holding his arm to his rent side. Dark blue blood poured over his fingers, but he shook his head as she reached him.

"Saren," Nihlus hissed, and gestured with his head.

She followed the gesture, and saw movement at the end of the dock. The gray-armored turian was running as fast as he could, and she rose.

"Don't worry, he's mine," she assured Nihlus, and started after Saren.

* * *

He was almost to the end of the docks, probably running for a ship that was hurrying to pick him up. Shepard charged after him, and engaged her jump jets. She hurtled up into the air after Saren, rapidly closing the distance, and as she dropped down the commando triggered a burst of gunfire into the middle of his back. His shields flared.

Saren jerked to a halt and spun around, raising his pistol. Shepard's boots hit the dock, and she raised the Werewolf, switching to railgun mode as she landed. Her eyes met Saren's cold blue down the sights of their respective weapons.

"One chance," she said. "Drop it."

"Do you know what happened to the last one who said that to me?" Saren replied.

She snarled and her finger tightened around the trigger.

Silver-white light pulsed again, and Shepard blinked before she could fire. A heartbeat later, a horror from her ugliest memories loomed behind Saren.

Standing behind him was a three meter tall, four-legged creature made of the same blue-gray metal-crystal of the rest of the Scrin. Its enormous upper body vaguely resembled the Shock Troopers, but sleeker and taller, with a single glowing white eye. Tendrils hung down beneath its head, long and delicate-looking.

Shepard instantly shifted her aim toward the hideous alien thing behind Saren. She sighted the Scrin Mastermind and pulled the trigger. The railgun thundered, pounding against her shoulder.

In the time it took her to acquire the new threat, the Mastermind had teleported through another pulse of cold silver light, and this time took Saren with it.

"Shit!" Shepard shouted as she stood alone on the docks. "Goddammit!"

Shepard trudged back to where the rest of the squad was securing the docks, and found Kaidan standing over Nihlus. The bleeding had stopped, and the Spectre was slowly standing.

"He got away," she said as she approached, forestalling any questions. Nihlus nodded.

"I saw," the Spectre replied. "You did your best."

"No, I should have shot him instead of asking him to surrender. Stupid of me."

"Perhaps," Nihlus agreed, and then turned, looking around the docks.

"Looking for this?" Kaidan asked, and he held up the glowing blue-white sphere. Nihlus stared at it, then at Kaidan. "What?" the mutant asked. "I found it beside you while I was treating you. Looked _important_."

That last line was delivered with a bit of biting sarcasm, which was a bit unusual for Kaidan . . . and no one present missed the fact that Kaidan was holding his sidearm.

"It is," Nihlus said, tone neutral, though Shepard got the impression he wanted nothing more than to snatch it out of the Lieutenant's hands -and might do it if he weren't surrounded by a number of heavily-armed GDI Marines. She stepped closer and peered at the object, and as she did, Shepard's heart shot into her throat.

"Is that what I think it is?" she asked, and took it from Kaidan's hands.

"Yes," Kaidan replied. "After all, pretty much any _human_ should recognize this."

She turned toward Nihlus, meeting the turian's green eyes.

"You knew," she whispered. "You _knew_ they found another _goddamned Tacitus_?"

The first alien data matrix that confirmed sapient extraterrestrial life existed had been recovered by GDI in the Second Tiberium War, nearly two hundred years ago – a device which had been in the hands of the Brotherhood of Nod, which GDI had recovered and used to stave off the extinction of mankind at the hands of tiberium. It had been kept a secret from the general public, changing hands between GDI and the Brotherhood during the Scrin attack on Earth, until it was ultimately damaged and destroyed some years after the Third Tiberium War.

The data it contained regarding tiberium and the Scrin was immense; a Tacitus was the Holy Grail of tiberium technology. It was even more valuable than the Prothean device they'd thought they were seeking, considering the limited understanding everyone had regarding tiberium even after two hundred years of study. And if the Citadel had acquired it, GDI's tenuous parity with the Citadel would be a memory.

"GDI InOps found it," Nihlus admitted. "From there it took the Citadel maybe a few hours to learn as well. Salarians work very quickly."

"That shouldn't be possible," Shepard whispered, shaking her head. "No intelligence agency works that fast."

"That's what they all say," Nihlus replied with a shrug. He winced in pain at the motion. "STG doesn't like drawing attention to their efficiency. They prefer people underestimate them."

He paused, mandibles clicking, green eyes meeting hers through her faceplate.

"We contacted GDI, and they agreed to share the data for the good of everyone." His gaze hardened. "And furthermore, this Tacitus _was_ found in a Prothean ruin. That alone is proof that the Protheans were connected with the Scrin and tiberium. We couldn't pass up the opportunity, and we had to keep it a secret. Need to know basis, Shepard."

She grunted, unhappy with that explanation. While she was all for GDI maintaining good relations with the Citadel, she was skeptical of them actually sharing this information with them. Unless someone up higher in the chain of command was looking for closer ties to the Citadel and willing to give up strategic secrets to secure them. Not to mention that Nihlus' refusal to tell her the truth of what they were after was pissing her off. Now she knew why he'd broken away to "reconnoiter."

"You were going to take the Tacitus and run, weren't you?" she asked, and he glared back at her.

"No," he replied, firm and direct. She blinked at his tone. "My orders were specific. This was a joint operation, and one intended to share technology. A peace offering between our peoples. If I had stolen the Tacitus, it would mean war."

She nodded after a couple of seconds, relaxing a little. Her gut told her not to trust Nihlus, though that may have simply been ingrained suspicion of nonhumans after all these years. The rescue at Elysium had not helped her get over the paranoia that had been part of her life since Akuze.

"I'm calling _Normandy _for extraction," she said after a moment. "We need to get this thing secured, and -"

Pain lanced through her, and Shepard fell to her knees. Sheer, pervasive sound and power rolled through her body.

The ground shook beneath her feet, agony split down the middle of her skull and flared along her implants and every single element zero node in her body. Beside her, Kaidan fell to the dock floor as well, and Shepard could feel Nihlus hand grabbing her and steadying her.

A kilometer away, the alien dreadnought began to ascend, pushing off the ground and sending out a pulsating wave of raw power.

In her fingers, the Tacitus began to flash faster and brighter. Her eyes were drawn down to it.

"No, Shepard!" Nihlus shouted. "It was damaged in the firefight! Don't look at it, you don't know what it will do!"

She couldn't pull her eyes away. Data snatched at her awareness and dragged it down into the blue-white recesses of pure knowledge.

The dreadnought continued to ascend.

The light moved faster.

It was

_trying to tell her something_

Data flooded into her. It beat against her synapses, pouring into her consciousness, a pure, unrelenting, absolute stream of _knowledge_.

She saw the dreadnought again, only it _wasn't._

_peace_

She saw black eyes.

_unity_

She saw beyond the eyes and what lay beneath.

_brotherhood_

Shepard pitched forward, and heaved up the contents of her stomach inside her helmet. Pain etched a pattern across her face and head and hammered her temples, and the knowledge beat against her mind until she toppled forward and hit the metal dock floor.

Then, there was only darkness.

* * *

_**Codex – Global Defense Initiative – Military Doctrine**_

The Council considers the Global Defense Initiative to be an "awakened giant" following the discovery of the Charon Relay. Access to tiberium and rapid fabrication technology that utilizes tiberium enables the Initiative to build and maintain an enormous military and support infrastructure despite its relatively small size and youth. GDI's population is also heavily militarized, due to a prolonged and violent history involving constant war and a struggle for survival against tiberium, which bred a strong tradition of military service into the human psyche even after mass emigration to orbital habitats, other planets in Sol, or extrasolar colonies. These factors combined make GDI into a military juggernaut not unlike that of the Turian Hierarchy.

GDI's military is a civilian-controlled, all-volunteer service. It does not possess the institutionalized discipline of the Turian Hierarchy, the individual skill or biotics of Asari Republic commando units, or the exceptional espionage and specialists of the Salarian Union. Instead, GDI's doctrine places emphasis on overwhelming force and firepower, and use of combined arms with mobile, hard-hitting ground and air units. This is exemplified in GDI's iconic war machines like the Mammoth Tank or _Glacier_-class dreadnoughts – vehicles so heavily armed and armored that they are nearly impractical to field, but are also nearly indestructible and can deploy staggering amounts of firepower.

Because of GDI's reliance on tiberium-based economics and industry, GDI severely restricts the transport of tiberium; absolutely no tiberium is allowed to leave the Sol system. The only known site of tiberium growth outside of Sol itself is the Akuze system, which is intensely guarded by GDI forces. Smuggling tiberium out of Sol or Akuze is considered a capital offense, and the Charon Relay is the single most heavily-guarded relay in the galaxy. However, GDI's reliance on tiberium-based manufacturing generates a notable strategic weak link, as the majority of GDI's military production is funneled through the Charon/Arcturus Relay. As a result, it takes time for supplies and materiel manufactured on Sol to reach the rest of the colonies. Since element zero must also be mined outside of Sol, an attack that disrupts this strategic weak link would cripple GDI's economy.

In space, GDI's navy is characterized by powerful cruisers and dreadnoughts, with heavy carrier support, using overwhelming firepower. Lighter cruisers and frigates are used as escorts or reconnaissance elements and screen the capital ships during combat. "Supercarriers" form the heart of many fleets, carrying equipment to rapidly fabricate parts, fighter craft, drones, and smaller frigates using local resources. The slow nature of GDI's faster-than-light drives hinders overall mobility. As a result, fleets focus on forcing decisive confrontations with enemy fleets, often striking at critical assets to force the enemy to stand and engage GDI warships.

Surface operations are characterized by aggressive response and assaults, whether on offense or defense; a common maxim of GDI doctrine is "Aggression, Mobility, Momentum, Shock." The typical response to an enemy attack is to counterattack, taking advantage of heavy armor, raw firepower, and industrial strength to overwhelm an attacker. Support assets are fluid and adaptable, and individual squads are capable of calling in support strikes. Fast-moving "wolfhound" units of mobile cavalry, aircraft, commando teams, and light mechs often move throughout the battlespace, striking at targets of opportunity and supporting primary assault elements; such units are often independent commands that report to corps, army, or army group-level commands. Field operations are often handled by in-field "battle commanders" who use extensive amounts of EVA support and sophisticated command software to provide their troops with extremely up-to-date information, targeting, and support. As a result, GDI forces are aggressive, violent, and have very high morale.

On planetary offense, GDI relies on wide-frontal attacks with large numbers of heavily armored, flexible units that strike in combined arms assaults. GDI specializes in powerful shock attacks that overwhelm defenders with sheer firepower, followed by fast-moving armored units and infantry to exploit openings in defenses. Ground units are commonly supported by orbital artillery, as well as rapid-striking, orbitally-deployed troops and vehicles. Initial strikes with siege ion cannons may be used to destroy or weaken major defensive positions prior to an assault, followed by "hot-dropping" infantry and armored vehicles directly into the battlezone in armored deployment shells, often impacting with destructive force comparable to ship-based broadside mass accelerators.

Defensively, GDI practices a policy of deterrence, both tactically and strategically. GDI naval forces are slow to respond due to less advanced and effective mass effect FTL drives, which slow interstellar transit within a particular star cluster. Relays are difficult and prohibitively expensive to adequately secure, meaning that only relays of extreme strategic value like the Arcturus/Sol Relay are covered by fleets and ion cannon arrays; other relays are monitored by small frigate and cruiser fleets and automated sensors that warn of incoming attack. To make up for this deficiency, colony worlds are heavily fortified with layered defenses, consisting of garrison fleets, orbital emplacements, surface-to-orbital defenses, Firestorm barriers, anti-air ground batteries, and surface garrisons supported by large numbers of civilian militia. The ultimate goal is to either make a colony an unappealing target for assault or to enable it to withstand assaults long enough for reinforcements to arrive.

Tying in with the deterrence policy is GDI's massive retaliation doctrine. In the event of a colony or ship being assaulted, GDI responds by identifying the source of the attack and retaliating with overwhelming force. For example, following the attack on Elysium during the Skyllian Blitz, GDI tracked the attack back to Torfan and obliterated the pirates' base from orbit. This doctrine led to a full-scale war between GDI and the Batarian Hegemony in retaliation for pirate raids on GDI colonies, a fact that has not been lost on other potentially hostile organizations. However, more than one Citadel official has accused GDI of attacking the Hegemony simply to "make an example out of them."


	5. Chapter 5: Technical Truths

**_Chapter Five: Technical Truths_**

_The Hammerhead's engines labored behind her as her boots hit the dirt. She crouched, the rotors chopping overhead, while the rest of the squad dismounted, triggering minimal thrust with their jetpacks to slow down their descent. They hit the ground around her, weapons at the ready, and the Hammerhead began to ascend, rotors pounding the grass at their feet and forcing the fireteams to stay crouched. Two centuries after the original design had been developed, GDI's ultra-conservative mindset ensured that the Hammerhead gunship was still equipped with "old-fashioned" rotors instead of turbofans….but then, the gunship was designed for work on the colonies, and they naturally got the more rugged, reliable, and low-tech designs, albeit with mass effect technology to make it much faster._

_Lieutenant Shepard watched her sector, weapon at her shoulder, and waited until they received the all-clear to advance. They were crouched on a low, rolling hill with chest-high grass of an odd, cobalt color, with other hills rising all around them, save for a depression half a kilometer away. She couldn't feel the wind billowing and brushing the grass due to her heavy armor. Feeds from the drones overlooking the area were splashed across her helmet display._

"_Squad, move up," she ordered. "Its new, but we need to be ready in case this one is different."_

_She received acknowledgements, and the squad rose from their crouch and began to advance, lowering and collapsing their weapons. The entire team was clad in lighter Marine armor, but three of her squadmates were wearing bulky shoulder-mounted sensors and backpacks, giving them a hunchbacked appearance._

"_Incursion team advancing," she reported into her radio as they moved across the hills and down into the depression. The grass began to thin. "We are five hundred meters from the outer edges of the growth zone."_

"Copy that,"_ replied CentCom, operating out of one of the platforms in orbit, having hastily evacuated after they made the discovery on the ground. _"Continue to advance to the outer edge of the affected area."

"_Acknowledged," Shepard replied, and started jump-jetting across the intervening terrain, her squad fanning out and following suit. None of them had their weapons in hand, as none of them expected to be shot at – but they were all stowed in easy reach on the chestplates of their armor. Just because they didn't expect to be shot at didn't mean that they had an excuse to be stupid._

_The squad landed and bounded once, then twice, and as they cut across the grassy field, the plants around them began to change in color. Some were drooping and turning brown, while others began to take on a distinctly vomit-like texture and color – though that may have been the ambient green glow that steadily grew. Shepard made sure to get solid readings on the changing plant life as she moved._

_By the end of the second bound, the squad had reached the edge of the effected zone. _

_It was a circle about a kilometer across, lined from end to end in barren brown and gray dirt, intermixed with fat-bodied brown-gray plant pods – and from each pod sprouted jagged green crystals._

_The Tiberium field ran from one end of the shallow impact crater to the other. The crater itself was recent, having slammed down six days ago, and the Tiberium infestation had moved fast – faster than it had on Earth, if Shepard remembered correctly._

_She didn't say anything as they moved around the field; anything she could add would be pointless. Most of the readings being provided by her squad had already been made by drones operating inside the fields, but command wanted boots on the ground to survey the scene once they'd confirmed this was first-generation Tiberium._

_Shepard peered over the green crystal, and took a step backward as the ground a few meters away stirred a bit, and a new plant-form began to slowly, millimeter by millimeter, rise out of the dirt._

Another Tiberium incursion, _she thought. Only this one was very recent, occurring shortly after the humans had arrived and started colonization_. What could that mea-

_Her scanners suddenly wailed as they detected a massive spike of energy along the same strange frequencies as the radiation the Tiberium was faintly emitting. Shepard jerked sideways at the noise._

_White light bathed her, not a dozen meters away, and she saw a shape lurch forward from the portal, dark and covered in organic-crystalline chitin._

"_Scrin!" Shepard yelled, as dozens more portals rippled into life all around her squad. Her Werewolf unfolded into her hands and she raised the weapon at the alien thing charging through the portal at her._

_Its form, indistinct and crystalline, began to elongate and darken. Chitin started taking on a dark, dull metallic sheen, and red lightning erupted down the Scrin's body._

_Shepard raised her weapon, firing and hearing screams, and she realized the screams were hers as the Scrin turned into long tendrils wreathed in bloody electrical havoc-_

* * *

"-oming around, Docctor!"

Male voice, familiar. His words were pounding into her head like artillery fire. Flashes of memory, of chitinous bodies, screaming soldiers, blinding light and the sick glow of growing Tiberium wound through her as voices hammered her from all sides. Intermixed with it all were black eyes, boring into her, and beyond them, that stretching, hand-like shape covering in crimson lightning.

With a grunt, Shepard forced her eyes open, and the blue-gray light of the interior of a GDI ship flooded into her. She winced at the new flavor of headache that gave her, and started to push herself up.

"Easy, Commander," a woman's voice, rich and sharp-accented, came to her. A hand steadied Shepard as she rose, and some distant part of the Commander's mind told her that it was Doctor Chakwas, the _Normandy's_ medical officer. She helped Shepard sit up and swing her legs off the side of the bed, and she became aware that she wasn't alone. Kaidan was standing at the foot of the bed, while an unfamiliar human in Marine fatigues was leaning against the wall. He was dark-skinned, heavily built and with close-shaved hair and beard.

At least, that was what Shepard made out through the fugue of pain pounding through her temples.

"How do you feel, Commander?" Doctor Chakwas asked.

"Like the morning after shore leave," she replied through her teeth. She focused on Chakwas' thin, willowy features and gray hair as the medical officer stood in front of her. The pain slowly receded, and she tried remembering what happened. "How did I end up here?"

"The Tacitus we found did something to both you and Nihlus," Kaidan explained. "We brought you both back here after the geth retreated."

"Eden Prime?" Shepard asked.

"Secured," said the other human Marine. She recognized his voice, but couldn't place it immediately. "That ship of theirs lifted off right after that other turian escaped. Scrin began teleporting geth troops back aboard their ships right afterward. The whole fleet was gone in an hour."

"How long was I out?" Shepard asked.

"About sixteen hours, give or take," Chakwas replied. "Lieutenants Alenko and Taylor brought you back here."

Shepard blinked, and then recognized Taylor's voice; she hadn't seen his features outside of his Zone Trooper armor.

"Thanks, both of you," she replied, and they nodded. A smile cut across Kaidan's features, and Taylor nodded. "What about the Tacitus and that other turian?"

"Not our place to tell," Taylor said after a moment. "Orders. Captain Anderson wanted to talk to you about th-"

The infirmary door slid open, and David Anderson strode into the room. The room went silent for a moment.

"Doctor," Anderson said. "How's our XO holding up?"

"Aside from some unusual brain activity, she'll be fine," Chakwas replied.

"What kind of brain activity?" Shepard asked.

"Abnormally high beta waves – signs generally associated with intense dreaming," Chakwas replied.

The dream . . . or, Shepard realized, the mangled flashback of the events on Akuze. But it was _wrong_, somehow. The Scrin hadn't attacked like that, the GDI troops had used drones to gather samples for weeks before sending a human recon team in . . . .

"It wasn't a dream," Shepard whispered, remembering the images and alien concepts and thoughts that had flooded into her mind when she'd first recovered the Tacitus. "It was . . . something else."

"What do you mean?" Anderson asked.

"The Tacitus was . . . transmitting something," she said, looking up at him. "Into my brain. It was a vision, or a message, or something."

"I'll have to add this to my report," Chakwas murmured.

"Thank you, Doctor," Anderson said, and his voice took on a stiffer tone. "I'd like to speak to the Commander privately, please."

"Aye aye, sir," both Kaidan and Taylor replied, their words the monotone sharpness of reflex, and they both stood straighter. A few moments later, only Shepard and Anderson were in the room.

"Good to see you back on your feet, Commander," Anderson said, and she nodded, regretting the motion.

"Bit unnerving and surreal, for a moment," she said, and let herself sag back down onto the bed. "Lieutenant Taylor being on board surprised me."

"We lost a lot of people down there," Anderson admitted. "I asked the Lieutenant if he wanted to take over as head of our Marine compliment. He agreed."

Shepard nodded. The small talk had a purpose, as it gave her a moment to settle back down and get her bearings – and more importantly, it let Shepard order her thoughts.

"Lieutenant Taylor said you wanted to speak to me about something," Shepard said, and Anderson nodded.

"About that other turian," Anderson replied, his expression darkening. Shepard narrowed her eyes, brow furrowing in thought. The way Anderson had spoken those words seemed as if it was familiar to him.

"You know who he was?" she asked.

"From Nihlus' description, and the recordings, yes," he replied. "His name is Saren Arterius. He's a Spectre."

"I know," Shepard said, nodding. "Nihlus told me about him, but he didn't say why he was working with the geth or Scrin."

"We don't know either," Anderson said. "He's anti-human, but I can't see why he'd be working with them to recover the Tacitus."

Shepard's eyes narrowed again. She could sense the undercurrent in his words, which meant Anderson knew Saren personally. She filed that fact away for later, and continued on with what was pertinent - the Tacitus itself.

"You held back on that, sir," she said, her words coming out a bit harsher than she'd intended. "We needed to know what we were looking for."

"I know," Anderson replied, and he turned, looking across the medical bay, his expression troubled.

"Captain?" she asked after a couple of seconds.

"As far as GDI was aware," Anderson said, "There was no Tacitus on Eden Prime when we sent you down there."

Silence passed through the bay, save for the distant thrumming of the _Normandy's_ electronics and the vibration of a ship in motion.

"But . . .how?" she asked after a moment, standing up straight. A bit of dizziness hit her, but Shepard ignored it. "Nihlus knew about the Tacitus."

"Yes, but I'm not sure how," Anderson said. "I read the InOps reports, and they never reported any such thing."

"Nihlus said InOps found the Tacitus," Shepard said, thinking over what she remembered from the ground operation. Through the pain, a sudden spike of anger and realization ran through her. "And the Citadel found it through them."

Her fingers clenched so tightly that she felt the pain in her palm through the orbital bombardment of a headache in her temples.

"Sir, where's Nihlus now?" Shepard hissed.

* * *

She still felt dizzy, but Shepard fought to keep her balance without showing any outward signs of her physical weakness. Instead, she flexed her biotic capabilities just enough to generate a faint, deep blue sheen of dark energy like what developed around biotics who were letting their anger take over. She kept a lid on the anger itself, but appearances were useful when one was staring down a Spectre.

The two Marines outside the communications room saw her striding toward them, and more importantly, they saw the pistol in her hand. They wisely went to attention.

"Marines," Shepard ordered, and gestured for the two men to follow her. She strode into the comms room, the door sliding open before her, and saw Nihlus. The Spectre was standing over a haptic display, typing intently. His head rose as she entered the room, and he turned toward her.

"Captain, I think-" he started, but by the time Nihlus had turned around, Shepard had crossed the room and jammed her pistol into his face.

The room went deadly still, the noise only broken by the Marines behind her belatedly unfolding and leveling their weapons.

"Commander," Nihlus said, as if he was passing her in the hallway. He didn't blink, but he didn't seem overtly surprised, confused, or worried that a mass accelerator was almost in his mouth. Shepard had to admit, Nihlus had balls - or whatever the turian equivalent was.

"What kind of bullshit are you pulling?" Shepard demanded.

"I could ask you the same question," he replied. "Where have you taken the Tacitus?"

Her eyes narrowed.

"What are you talking about?" she asked.

"The Tacitus was supposed to be transported onto the Normandy for safekeeping until it could be brought to the Citadel for analysis," Nihlus replied, still unperturbed by the angry human with an organ-pulping weapon in his face. "GDI reinforcements on the scene confiscated it. The Council is upset - to say the least - that GDI broke the word of our agreement."

"That agreement was null when you lied to us about the Tacitus," Shepard snarled.

This time, Nihlus did seem surprised.

"What?" he asked, eyes widening a hair - which was about as far as they would on a turian.

"According to the InOps reports, there was no Tacitus," Anderson said from behind Shepard, his voice calm and reasoned. Nihlus' eyes flicked to him. "GDI believed that it was a Prothean beacon, nothing more."

"The InOps reports we acquired explicitly mentioned a Tacitus," Nihlus replied.

A few moments' silence followed as that sank in.

"Before we continue," Anderson said, "Everyone, lower your weapons."

Shepard opened her mouth to say she was the only one with a gun drawn - save the Marines behind Anderson - but caught a bit of movement at the bottom of her eye. She glanced down and saw that Nihlus had palmed a small pistol at some point and was leveling it at her stomach.

No wonder he'd been so calm.

Shepard nodded and lowered her pistol. Nihlus followed suit once the barrel of her gun was no longer pointed at him. They waited until the weapons were collapsed and holstered before continuing.

"The InOps reports we acquired clearly said that there was a Tacitus contained in the beacon," Nihlus repeated.

"And I read the reports," Anderson replied. "They only mentioned a beacon, nothing about a Tacitus. The brass at _Philadelphia_ confirmed it."

"That doesn't make any sense," Nihlus said, mandibles narrowing in a turian frown. "The Citadel contacted GDI through secure channels, and GDI agreed that the Tacitus would be removed in a joint effort immediately. We would negotiate for information and analysis rights after it was extracted to the Citadel Tower."

"The briefing I received said it would be extracted to the GDI Embassy on the Citadel," Anderson murmured.

A few seconds passed, during which the implications sank in.

"Someone is playing a game here," Shepard said, and Nihlus nodded sharply.

"I agree," he said. "Someone in either the Citadel or GDI is falsifying information. And it's not hard to guess why."

Shepard had to agree. The anti-alien (or rather, anti-Citadel) bloc in the GDI's Director's Board was powerful, and would gain nothing but benefits from making the Council seem untrustworthy and deceptive. On the flip side, the anti-GDI elements of the Citadel, particularly the turian bloc headed by Councilor Velarn, would gain from making GDI seem equally deceptive.

"We need to sort this out before things get worse," Anderson said. "Accusations are already flying back and forth. I'll get on the line with _Philadelphia_, and warn the brass what's happening."

"I'll do the same for the Council," Nihlus added. "With some luck, we might be able to calm this situation down and find out who is running a con on who."

* * *

The mess was automated, and located right outside the sleeping pods. With the _Normandy_ being a frigate, there wasn't much room for a large table, but everyone else was at their duty stations, leaving Shepard alone to eat. She wolfed down the rations, which were unique in their blandness. That was to be expected when dining on a military vessel, but at least the food was filling, and more importantly, it replaced the calories she'd lost fighting. Flexing her biotic muscles took a lot of energy.

It didn't help that she'd burned up a lot of additional calories in the cargo bay after the confrontation with Nihlus. The cold, rational anger that had been cooking inside her had to work its way out of her system, as did the memories of Akuze and the impressions brought back by fighting the Scrin again. Thus, she'd used the small exercise area in the corner of the hold to burn off the stress and emotion, leaving herself clear-headed.

It wouldn't do for the crew to see her angry; she needed to appear to be in control.

She had finished writing the report that would go to both the Director's Board and the Council, along with Nihlus and Anderson's reports, when some settled down in the seat opposite hers, a tray in hand. Shepard glanced up, to see Jacob Taylor. Up close, she had a better look at the Zone Marine, noting his rounded features, close-cropped hair, and the quick smile that came to his face.

"Morning, Commander," he said with a nod. "You doing alright?"

"Just proofing my report," she replied.

"Don't want typos slipping in to the Council," Taylor agreed with a nod. He took a few bites of the food-like substance on his tray. "How you holding up?"

"Something to be concerned about?" Shepard asked. Taylor shrugged.

"You got your brain scrambled by a data sphere holding more info than all of recorded human history," he said. "Just wanted to make sure you were okay."

"Thanks," Shepard said, and she let a smile creep onto her face. "I appreciate it."

"No problem, Commander," he replied. Shepard studied his face for a moment as he kept eating, and noted something in his expression, something that was hard to place, but she made an educated guess.

"How about you?" she asked. "Your squad took heavy losses on Eden Prime. Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he said with a nod, and his voice became distant. "I've seen folks die before. Was on a rotation in the Verge during the first actions against the Hegemony. Lost a lot of good people out there when it turned out the batarian soldiers don't fold as easily as their pirates." He stirred his food for a moment. "I try to keep a clear mind when it comes to people dying. We're all volunteers, you know? We took the job knowing the risks."

"Some people still have a hard time dealing with it," she replied. "Even after a long service."

Those words brought back the vivid memories that the Tacitus' induced vision had rekindled. Flashes of Akuze started to work their way back up into her mind, but she fought them down with a moment of clenched teeth, and she looked back down to her datapad.

"Yeah, it doesn't get any easier," Taylor mused, apparently not noticing. He ate the last few bites of his technically-food and stood up. "Nice talking with you, Commander."

"Anytime, Taylor," she replied.

* * *

It turned out that both the Council and the Director's Board understood that someone was playing a deception. They both listened as Anderson and Nihlus explained what they'd learned, deliberated over the idea, and responded.

In this case, that response was to loudly accuse each other of outright deception about a critical strategic resource.

"I want to say I'm surprised," Nihlus said in the comms room the next day, "But this is the Council."

Aside from Anderson, Shepard, and Nihlus, the _Normandy's_ ranking officers were present as well, which included Chief Engineer Adams and Navigator Pressly, along with Lieutenant Taylor. Lieutenant Alenko rounded out the group.

"I'd say the same," Anderson agreed. "GDI has never been terribly compromising."

"So I've gathered from your history," Nihlus replied.

"Where does this leave us?" Shepard asked.

"I've managed to get in touch with Admiral Parker with InOps and SOFCOM," Anderson said. "He's reasonable enough, and he's investigating the possibility of communications tampering."

"Is that possible?" Pressly asked. "I thought communications through comm buoys couldn't be tampered with."

"Not impossible, but almost," Kaidan mused. "To pull it off you'd have to be tapped into a specific relay buoy, know what data stream to filter out of all the incoming information, break the encryption on the transmission, and alter it before the relay sends it. Any delay'll cause lag, and high-level communications like what Nihlus is suggesting would have almost no lag at all, so any delay will be a clear sign of tampering."

"What about the source?" Taylor asked. "Tamper with the communications at the transmission point?"

"That would require breaching either GDI or Citadel communications security," Nihlus said. "Nearly as hard as altering the message in transit."

"Which brings us back to the notion that someone on either side is screwing someone else over," Taylor concluded. "This has got to be an inside job."

"What about the geth and Scrin?" Kaiden cut in. "I know that figuring out who played who on the Tacitus is important, but what are we doing about the attack and that Spectre?"

"GDI's directing resources to covering the colonies, but we don't have much to spare," Anderson admitted. "We've already got so many resources tied up fighting the batarians. Putting additional forces in place to protect the colony worlds is going to stretch our manpower thin."

"The Council has stripped Saren of his status," Nihlus added. "We have conclusive video and audio proof, taken directly from my suit and Shepard's. While GDI is not a member of the Citadel, his actions were a deliberate provocation and he assaulted a fellow Spectre with intent to kill." Nihlus eyes narrowed. "As soon as I've delivered my personal report to the Council, I'm going after him."

"Good to know the Council is taking care of business," Shepard said. "What are they doing about the geth and Scrin?"

"GDI is not a member of the Citadel," Nihlus replied. "While Saren is working with the geth and Scrin, they did not attack a Citadel world."

"In other words," Taylor muttered. "GDI's on its own."

Nihlus nodded.

"So," Adams spoke up in his gravelly voice, "We're ferrying Nihlus back to the Citadel?"

"Director Saracino and Ambassador Udina want to speak with me personally," Anderson said. "They're pushing for a joint effort to track down Saren, since he attacked a GDI world."

"That won't happen," Nihlus said. "Not without some serious convincing. The Council won't condone GDI military forces roaming Citadel space."

"Saracino won't take no for an answer," Anderson said, and Nihlus nodded. With anyone else, that might have been taken as a threat, but Nihlus and Anderson were about as hot-headed as liquid nitrogen.

"How long until we get there?" Shepard asked.

"Two days," Anderson replied. "At least with Nihlus on board we can get past all the checkpoints."

* * *

_"Incoming vessel, state your business and transmit identification."_

Shepard stood on the bridge behind Joker, and peered out through the _Normandy's_ rather limited observation ports. The lavender-colored expanse of the Serpent Nebula spread out before them, a murky and near-impenetrable gas cloud that obscured incoming and outgoing sensor signals.

Obscuring, however, didn't mean that they were invisible, and the _Normandy_ was picking out the sensor trails of hundreds of ships ahead, deeper inside the nebula. More importantly, Citadel Security had picked out their ship almost the instant they'd transitioned into the nebula from the mass relay.

"GDS _Normandy_," Joker replied. "On official government business. We're transporting a Council Spectre."

_"Acknowledged," _replied the C-Sec controller on the other wise. _"Come to heading being transmitted now. Do not deviate and follow docking instructions."_

The speaker on the other end - it sounded like a turian - was polite, but the tone of his voice barked with absolute authority. Joker picked up on it.

"Acknowledged," Joker replied, and then switched off the transmitter. "Must have taken an extra helping of his asshole rations today."

"Just take us in without getting the ship blown up," Shepard ordered.

"Yes ma'am. Hate to fill out the forms on that one. Cause of damage: incoming fire from paranoid aliens because Joker was a tool!"

Shepard ignored the pilot's whining as they continued toward the Citadel itself. The lavender clouds began to part as they approached, and Shepard was hit with the full splendor of the Citadel's vast size and bulk. She'd seen it before in pictures and vids, but seeing the five stretching arms and the glittering crossroads of lights in the Ward arms was something else entirely.

The more practical side of her, however, noted the presence of a substantial number of Citadel warships, including the enormous elegant cross of the _Destiny Ascension_, the most powerful ship in the Citadel navy, as at least three of the dagger-shaped turian dreadnoughts.

Two frigates, looking like smaller, narrower versions of the two-kilometer-long dreadnoughts, arrowed up toward the _Normandy_ as it approached. They swung around into a tight escort formation less than four kilometers away on either side. Shepard mentally counted to two, and right on cue, Joker cut in.

"No, that's not threatening _at all_," he muttered.

"Just take us in, like the nice, trigger-happy C-Sec officers asked us to," Kaidan added.

They brought the _Normandy_ in closer to the Citadel, and Shepard glanced to Joker's display. On the screen, she counted the identifier tags of thousands of ships, both inbound and outgoing, and noted the miniscule number of GDI ships present – at least in comparison to _human_ vessels as a whole. A lot of colonies had been founded in the last thirty years that didn't acknowledge GDI's power, and many of them had enough resources and fabrication tech to quickly assemble their own ships. The Citadel was naturally faster to accept non-GDI humans.

"Don't see any of ours out here," Joker mused. "Except . . . wait, there's the _Kursk_, docked at the hangar we're headed to. Isn't that Admiral Parker's ship?"

"Yeah, he's supposed to be meeting us here," Shepard said.

The _Normandy_ drew closer to the Citadel, the Ward arms reaching around it like outstretched fingers; it reminded her uncomfortably of the appendages of the alien dreadnought on Eden Prime. They maneuvered toward one of the docking bays that extended from the Ward arms, the shimmering lights of the cityscape resolving into individual buildings and the constant waterflow of aircars streaming throughout the city. As they closed on the docking structure, a hangar bay that was part of one of the Citadel Security buildings for the Ward, Shepard could see the towering skyscrapers that made up the majority of the Wards, blue-white daggers of ceramic and metal that glistened with what seemed to be millions of gemstones, but she knew they were holographic advertisements, newscasts, and extranet shows.

"Okay, let's go meet our friends," Shepard said as they slid into the docking space, electromagnetic locks sliding down to brace the _Normandy_ as it came to a halt.

Anderson wanted the ranking officers of the ground team from Eden Prime to be present at the meeting. Per the captain's orders, Shepard was wearing her armor, as was Kaidan. Taylor had to take one of the spare suits from the lockers, as wearing his hulking Zone armor on the Citadel was like showing up to a fancy dress party in a Mammoth Tank. Though they were going armed, they were only carrying sidearms; Anderson wanted to make it clear they were present in a military capacity, but not in a hostile manner.

Nihlus strode up onto the bridge as the four humans entered the airlock. He followed them in, clad in his dark red-black combat armor, and gave a short nod of approval at the GDI troops' choice of attire. A moment later, the airlock finished cycling, and they stepped out onto the platform overlooking the vast docking facility built into the side of the C-Sec building. It wasn't a private docking facility like he kind many of the Citadel governments had, and as a result the _Normandy_ was one of dozens of ships on this level of the facility. The rumble and hiss of working engines, the braying of docking sirens, the faint ozone scent of crackling and discharging engines all blurred together in a familiar torrent of noise and scent.

A short corridor ran out from the docking bay, passing through a C-Sec checkpoint manned by an asari and a turian. They bristled at the armored GDI troops, but did nothing more than offer them a standard scan. Maybe the presence of Nihlus dissuaded them, Shepard mused.

They passed through the checkpoint and into the blue-lit interior of the Citadel Security facility, which opened out into a wide plaza with dozens of officers in the blue-black uniforms of the police force moving about, some speaking to civilians and others clearly on guard - the latter of which were marked by full combat armor and assault weapons in hand. Shepard noted the majority were turian, with the rest made up of salarians, asari, and only a smattering of humans.

"Lot of guards around," Kaidan mused. "C-Sec looks more like a military operation than a police force."

"Considering what their job is to protect?" Jacob mused. "Don't blame 'em."

"Nihlus," Anderson said, ignoring the commentary behind him. "Are you coming with us to the embassy?"

"No, the Council is requesting me personally," the Spectre replied, voice tinged with a faint bit of amusement. "Bringing charges against a fellow Spectre . . . they're going to want a private conversation, especially if communications have been compromised like we suspect." He glanced around at the C-Sec officers. "Watch yourself. C-Sec is too disciplined to cause you trouble, but this is the Citadel. GDI soldiers in full uniform aren't welcome here."

"We'll be careful," Anderson assured him. "Anyone who messes with this team is in for an ugly surprise."

"Anyone stupid enough to openly attack you deserves what happens to them," Nihlus replied. "The dangerous ones are those who aren't that dumb, but still want to cause trouble. Keep your eyes open, Captain; the Wards aren't safe, no matter what the Citadel wants to imply otherwise."

* * *

Leaving the C-Sec facility was easy enough; though the guards kept an eye on the human party, they seemed all too eager to get the GDI troops out of sight. From there, it was a short ride on an aircar to the GDI Embassy.

The Wards, Shepard saw while en route, were more than just a collection of skyscrapers built into the vast arms of the enormous space station. Each building was itself a network of corridors, balconies, and walkways, which ran from structure to structure, serviced by hundreds of garages that held the aircars that traveled between the vast buildings. Transit was strictly enforced, as any car veering off the assigned routes ran the risk of plowing through the countless bridges and passages between each of the outstretched buildings.

The GDI Embassy was based out of one of the skyscrapers on the predominantly mixed-species Ward, known as Zakera. From what Shepard had learned, GDI had been refused an embassy on the Presidium, because GDI refused to have their security handled by C-Sec. They wanted armed GDI guards inside a compound, which the Citadel refused to allow on the Presidium.

The politics of the situation were also unusual, mostly because GDI was the only non-Citadel government that possessed an embassy. The krogan had closed their embassy when the Rebellions had begun, and the Batarian Hegemony had closed theirs out of protest when the Citadel refused to help them in the Verge War. But even when they had existed, the krogan and Hegemony had maintained their embassies on the Presidium. _No_ species or government had an embassy on the Wards, and Shepard knew it was a calculated gesture by the Citadel to remind GDI of its place.

There were four armed Marines on guard in the walkway outside the GDI Embassy, but Shepard knew that the rest of the squad was inside, ready to rush out at the first hint of gunfire. They checked the new arrivals, verified their identities, and allowed them into the outer hallway, where the rest of the security team and a pair of tech specialists were waiting to subject Anderson's group to screening.

Twenty minutes of probing and security checks with the most advanced scanning technology GDI and the Citadel possessed later, they were allowed inside the actual embassy perimeter. To everyone else, GDI's insistence on such exhaustive security measures was paranoid to the point of insanity. To GDI, it was a fundamental part of a doctrine that had kept the organization intact for a hundred and eighty years.

One of the unforeseen advantages of GDI's embassy being based out of a private building was that their embassy was larger than other Citadel species'. The GDI facility was a hefty collection of offices and hallways and apartments, unlike the other embassies, which were little more than large office compounds for bureaucrats. All told, the whole complex took up ten levels on the uppermost floor of the building, placing it above the level of the walkways, and a double-strength company of Marines were assigned to security work.

The Ambassador's office was on the uppermost floor, next to a balcony large enough to park an assault shuttle on. Anderson's group rode the elevator up to the top level and stepped into the hallway outside the office, and heard a pair of men arguing.

"Of course the Council is stonewalling us!" snarled a harsh, nasal, heavily-accented voice. "They'll do anything they can to hinder us, and this attack is just good news for them!"

"I may agree," replied a man with a low and languid drawl. "And as much as I don't like it, they've got a reason to. Not that we should just bend over and-"

Andrson hit the door chime, and the office door slid open. The two men inside looked up at the intrusion. One was an olive-skinned man in his upper years, judging by the complexion and the salt-and-pepper of his hair, while the other was a clean cut, dark-haired figure with a tightly-clipped beard. Both wore dark-gray suits, though the bearded man's outfit was far neater and finer.

"Ambassador Udina," Anderson said, addressing the graying, elderly figure. "And Director Saracino," he added with a bit of surprise to the bearded man. "I apologize for the interruption."

"No matter, Captain," drawled Saracino, a wide smile coming to his face. "We weren't discussing anything critical, just complaining about the aliens' usual bull."

Shepard kept the surprise off her face. Director Charles Saracino was on the Director's Board, the GDI civilian executive-legislative body. He was head of the Terra Firma party, and was also the Chairman of the GDI Committee on Human Independence. What was he doing here?

"Well, Captain, I see you brought your entire crew with you," Udina grumbled, glancing at the trio of armored troops behind Anderson.

"Just the ranking ground team members from Eden Prime," Anderson said. "In case you had any questions."

"I've read the reports," Udina said.

"We naturally assumed they were accurate," Saracino added. "I trust our officers. More important is this deception regarding the Tacitus, and this rogue Spectre."

"Is that why you're here, Director?" Anderson asked.

"That would be correct," Saracino replied. "I was already here on an unrelated issue, but once this crisis started I took charge here at the embassy. I'm going to be representing GDI's interests in a few hours at the Council hearing."

"They're calling a hearing already?" Shepard asked, and Saracino nodded.

"To, and I quote, 'assess the potential threat of the geth and Scrin incursion to Citadel interests,'" he said. "It's in our best interests to convince the Council that they are a threat, which shouldn't be too hard when they've got a traitorous Spectre working for them and a dreadnought that's beyond anything in either of our arsenals' capabilities."

"If you don't mind, Director, I want to be at that hearing," she said. "An eyewitness from the ground can't hurt. "

"I was hoping you'd say that, Commander," Saracino said, his grin growing. "The meeting is in four hours at the Citadel Tower. I'll make sure your team is cleared to enter."

* * *

Anderson, Udina, and Saracino left an hour early, departing by air car to the tower, an enormous spike rising out of the Presidium ring and jabbing out into space.

It turned out that Saracino didn't just make sure they were cleared to enter; when the time came a few hours later to head for the tower, there was another aircar waiting for her, Kaidan, and Taylor, which took them directly across the length of Zakera Ward and to the Citadel Tower. Most access routes were through the Presidium, but diplomats arriving directly from the docks in the Wards were allowed to dock at a receiving station outside the tower - effectively letting them bypass going through the Presidium altogether. Since the GDI party was approaching from the Wards the same way, they went to the station as well.

"So, the Council tries to snub GDI by forcing us to stay outside the Presidium," Kaidan mused, "and thus we get to avoid everyone else on the Presidium and have a huge embassy all to ourselves?"

"Well, if you're given a bad situation, make the most out of it," Shepard replied.

"I'm not complaining," Taylor added with a grin.

"The Council received our reports," Kaidan said a few moments later. "I wonder if they'll ask us any questions?"

"Might," Taylor said. "We were pretty thorough, like the Director said."

"Just keep calm in there," Shepard added. "The turians will look for any excuse to make GDI look bad. Velarn is head of the anti-GDI bloc on the Council, so be careful what you say."

"You know a lot about Citadel politics, ma'am?" Taylor asked.

"Yes," she replied. "I keep track of things on the political side. Hobby of mine."

"Didn't think you'd have time for it, being a Commando and a general officer," Taylor said, sounding impressed.

"Most girls had dolls," Shepard replied, glancing back to him and smiling. "I had a datapad with _The Prince_."

"Ma'am," Kaidan said, completely without sarcasm, "you must have had a strange childhood."

The aircar docked at the station, and they passed through a much more stringent set of security probes, with their weapons being secured by the C-Sec teams on duty. Anderson met them inside, and waved for them to hurry down the corridor.

"They've already started the hearing," he said as they approached, and that got them into a run. "We'd better move quickly, it's in the main chambers on the top floor and the Citadel's elevators were contracted out to the lowest bidder."

"Can't be worse than GDI elevators," Shepard muttered.

Five minutes of ascent later, she changed her opinion.

"I can hack the controls, speed it up if you want," Kaidan offered as they waited for the lift to reach the t op.

"No, we'll just wait," Shepard replied to the only halfway-joking offer.

A few more minutes passed, and an occasional round of advertising played over the speakers, intermixed with news reports.

"So," Taylor said, after one advertisement played, "Elcor. Doing Hamlet. Not sure I want to know how that turns out."

Silence from the others indicated their assent.

A few minutes later, the elevator reached the upper floor, and they stepped out into the Council Chambers.

The first thing that greeted them was the warm, fresh scent of flowers, mixed with the sound of clear, running water. The corridor leading from the elevator opened up into a massive, vaulted chamber that seemed less like a government meeting room and more like an atrium mixed with a cathedral. The entire chamber was suffused with a mixture of white and a purple light from the far walls, into which was set a massive window that looked out into the Serpent Nebula.

The Council Chamber consisted of four tiers; first was the narrow hallway they stood in, which opened into a wide space around a large, bubbling fountain. The quartet of humans walked up the next set of stairs, which opened into a large plaza. The center of the plaza was mostly open, with rock gardens mixed with pink-blossomed trees running along the center of the tier. Either side featured shadowed balconies below low ceilings that were held up by pillars. There were plenty of side alcoves and benches scattered around for quiet meetings.

Shepard noticed it at the same time Taylor did.

"Those stairs," he said. "Elevated, clear lines of fire, built-in barricades. Set an HMG up there and there, you could sweep this whole approach."

Shepard nodded. The narrow corridor leading out of the elevator and the open area around the fountain made for excellent killing fields for anyone on the stairs. On the second tier, the open plaza afforded little cover, and shooters behind the pillars and on the third and fourth tiers could lock any intruders in a cross-fire. Shepard wouldn't want to assault this chamber if she could avoid it.

The third tier was a few narrow walkways with benches; the only thing notable was that the railings were thick, solid, and afforded excellent cover. As they got closer, Shepard could hear voices coming down from the fourth tier; the Council Chamber's acoustics were apparently built so that it would be hard to hear what was being discussed on the upper levels from the lower ones. Still, she could make out a woman's voice, which spoke with unquestioned authority - which meant that was Councilor Tevos, the asari third of the Council.

"Spectre Nihlus has confirmed Saren's involvement in this act. This is something we cannot deny," Shepard heard Tevos say as they approached. "Obviously, we were in error in placing him in his current position. That error is being corrected, and Nihlus is being assigned to deal with Saren as we speak."

The Council stood across a wide gap in the floor, directly before the vast windows looking out into the Serpent Nebula. Between the Council and those addressing them was a pit that held another rock garden; a narrow walkway ran out to a platform directly over the pit, where those who would speak to the Council stood. On either side of the chamber were several balconies where spectators – usually dignitaries, diplomats, and government officials - watched the proceedings.

There was one hell of a crowd today, and the GDI group had to - politely - push through a thick collection of various alien dignitaries of multiple shapes and sizes to see the central platform, where Udina and Saracino were making their case.

"That's not good enough," Udina said, his voice loud and forceful, and Shepard saw him making emphatic gestures with each word. Behind him stood Saracino, calm and controlled, a distinct and doubtless choreographed opposite to Udina. "This turian has attacked our world! We must be allowed to hunt him down!"

"We have no pressing reason to allow GDI troops to enter Citadel space," Councilor Velarn stated. The turian Councilor's face was marked with a red base facepaint with white slashes along his angled features, and his voice was a clear, brassy contrast to Udina's. "This is an internal matter involving the Spectres. We shall deal with it ourselves."

"Saren is responsible for attacking a GDI world," Udina snarled. "I demand justice! I demand that we punish him for this act!"

"You don't get to make demands of the Council, _Ambassador_," Velarn snarled.

"Be that as it may," Director Saracino cut in, "We are going to prosecute this Spectre for his crimes. And we won't take kindly to being denied."

"Is that a threat, Director?" asked Velarn, leaning forward over his podium.

"I'm simply pointing out that we're not going to leave justice up the competence of the Council," Saracino said. "Judging by your history, GDI has little reason to believe you'll handle it properly."

"History?" Velarn snapped, rising to the Director's taunt. "No Citadel species has been so incompetently self-destructive as to let its homeworld be consumed by a mindless _crystal_."

"No," Udina replied, "You're just idiotic enough to uplift the krogan when-"

"Enough," Councilor Tevos cut in, and incidentally, cut the microphones of both speakers. Silence filled the Council Chamber.

"The Council will consider your request," the salarian Councilor stated. Shepard couldn't place his name, or his face, really, seeing how the wide-eyed alien was hidden inside the folds of a large black cloak and hood. "Without an extradition treaty between our nations, however, I am afraid there is little we can offer in terms of legal cooperation."

"What about the Scrin?" Saracino demanded. "And the geth? We can't just ignore them."

"The geth and Scrin threats are overblown nonsense," Velarn replied, his voice picking back up as he reactivated his microphone. "We have never even encountered the Scrin before, and the geth have remained behind the Perseus Veil for three hundred years. Neither of them have threatened a Citadel world, and we have no reason to believe they will, especially considering that the Scrin only care about Tiberium, which GDI has been loathe to share."

"I agree," Councilor Tevos added. "Unless reliable proof can be provided that either the Scrin or the geth do in fact pose a threat to the Citadel, we cannot take action."

_"I would respectfully disagree, Councilor," _cut in a new voice, melodious and almost . . . amused. The voice echoed around the chamber, and everyone looked up in surprise and confusion.

"What the hell?" Udina muttered. "Who was that?"

"Sounded human," Anderson muttered into Shepard's ear. She nodded in agreement.

"What is going on here?" Velarn demanded.

To the left of the Councilors, an enormous holographic projector flickered to life, and a few seconds of flashing russet light later, a figure appeared. It was mostly shrouded in darkness, but the face was exposed, revealing a human male with a tightly clipped goatee and mustache, a perfectly bald head, dark eyes, and a knowing smile.

Shepard's heart clenched in her chest. Every human in the room recognized that face.

_"Speaking from personal experience," _the man's voice continued, now definitely sounding amused, _"I would agree that the . . . Scrin, I suppose is the proper word, would indeed represent a threat to the Citadel, because of their technology and capabilities."_

"Not possible," Saracino muttered, and the holographic figure shifted a moment later to face the knot of humans standing on the platform.

_"Ah, Director," _the figure said, grin widening. _"For one as versed in history as I expect, you should know by now that when something is proven over and over again, it certainly is possible."_

"He's dead," Saracino said. "It's been a hundred and fifty years."

_"Come now, a hundred and fifty years is a meager timescale. Just ask our friends on the Council."_

The figure turned and nodded to them, and then swiveled back to the humans.

_"And of course," _the holographic specter added, _"one should always remember what I've proven so many times before:_

_"You can't kill the Messiah."_

* * *

_**Codex - Technology - Jetpacks**_

_Jetpack technology was initially developed by the Citadel species more than a thousand years before GDI made contact with them, and was readily available. However, the doctrines of the various Citadel species limited the usage of jetpack technology to specialist troops and mercenaries; the majority of the duties that could be handled by jetpack equipped troops were instead given over to VI-controlled drones. Airmobile and fast-movement ground units instead favored jumpjet-equipped rovers and fast-moving airborne troop transports._

_GDI forces, however, integrated jetpack infantry into their doctrine from an early period, due to the unique geographical issues with their homeworld. Each generation of jetpacks became lighter, cheaper, and more effective, and the current generation integrates mass effect technology to further increase speed and lift as well as reduce fuel consumption and size._

_Current-generation jetpacks are about the size of a small briefcase and are integrated into all GDI Marine armor suits. They consist primarily of a miniaturized engine powered by a small reactor, coupled with personal mass effect generators that reduce mass and allow for easier maneuvering. The usefulness of an infantry corps capable of ignoring terrain -particularly in an urban environment - was demonstrated during the Shanxi war, as GDI Marines were able to consistently outmaneuver the less mobile turian infantry forces in urban conflicts, allowing them to maintain mobility, initiative, and both fire superiority and ability to disengage. As a result, various Citadel species are reassessing their doctrines in regard to jetpack-equipped soldiers; salarian STG units now carry such equipment standard, and many asari militias are integrating jetpacks into their units._

_Jetpacks have drawbacks, however. Because of the requirement for both mass effect generators and a separate reactor and engines, jetpack troops have significantly greater element zero masses than foot-mobile infantry and are much easier to spot on thermal sensors. In area with anti-air coverage, jetpack troops are at high risk while maneuvering. At Shanxi, for example, Hierarchy troops countered jetpacks with overlapping anti-air capability coupled with large numbers of recon and gun drones to limit the mobility of GDI troops. If unable to pin a squad down, the Hierarchy would use sensors to isolate the jetpack troops and bombard them with orbital and ground artillery and airstrikes. _

* * *

_Until next chapter . . . ._


	6. Chapter 6: Resurrection

_**Chapter 6: Resurrection**_

Silence filled the Council Chamber, as the GDI delegation stared up at the bald man looming over them all. It was broken a moment later as a series of hushed murmurs ran through the mostly-alien crowd, the commentary largely depending on whether or not the individual in question was versed in human history. In the latter case, it was mostly "Who is this oddly hairless human?" while in the former case, it was a number of contextually sensitive variations of "Oh, _shit_."

Shepard herself stood silent, processing what she was seeing. The hologram looming over the chamber was of the founder of the Brotherhood of Nod, who had waged three long and bloody wars against GDI more than a century ago, and was supposed to be dead, vaporized in a tiberium detonation that had flattened Eastern Europe.

Udina broke the torrent of murmurs.

"Kane," he said, his tone somewhere between a hiss, a snarl, and a gasp of disbelief.

_"I would say 'In the flesh,' but . . . " _the hologram replied, and then tilted his head slightly. _"Oh, don't look so surprised, Ambassador. The Brotherhood has kept faith that I would return, and despite GDI's declarations, you never did find a body at Sarajevo over a century ago."_

Shepard turned toward Kaidan while Kane was taunting the Ambassador.

"Alenko," she said, "this has to be wireless."

"Yes ma'am," he replied, and fired up his omnitool, understanding what she wanted him to do.

"This is some kind of trick," Saracino cut in. "We have found evidence that someone has compromised Citadel communications. This isn't really Kane, not after a hundred and thirty years."

_"Director," _Kane replied, his grin widening. _"I find your lack of faith disturbing."_

Jacob muttered something beside Shepard, about waiting a long time to use that line. She ignored him, focusing on Kaidan.

"Got it," Kaidan whispered to Shepard, and the mutant technician scowled. "Coming from short range. I think . . . inside this room."

Shepard looked up, eyes tracking across the room as Udina snapped a reply that she missed. As she peered across the chamber and the assembled aliens, she noticed that the Council was standing idly by. It was hard to read the salarian Councilor's expression, and Velarn's was the usual impassive turian mask, but Tevos did not seem to be surprised that Kane had appeared - rather, she seemed vaguely annoyed. All three Councilors were typing into their consoles' haptic displays, likely conversing silently while the hologram taunted the GDI politicians.

_"Please, Ambassador," _Kane said to whatever Udina had yelled at him. _"No matter what falsehoods and lies GDI wishes to spread, it is impossible to deny the faithful their prophet."_

"Alenko," Shepard said. "I'm getting tired of hearing him talk."

"Aye aye, ma'am," Kaidan replied, and keyed his omnitool.

_"I have returned," _the hologram said. _"To bring truth and guidance to all who would list-" _The hologram vanished, Kane's words cut off mid-sentence.

"And done," Kaidan murmured, a smile cutting across his face.

Silence filled the chamber, quickly replaced by murmurs and comments from the various dignitaries. Udina and Saracino spoke quickly, while the Councilors kept their silent conversation going. Finally, the Ambassador stepped forward again.

"Obviously, this was a deception," Udina spoke, his voice loud and clear. "Propaganda by Nod sympathizers or remnants. I move that this interruption be stricken from the record and-"

"Commander Shepard!"

The room went dead silent at the interrupting voice, which seconds before had been coming from the chamber's speakers. Heads and other relevant sensory body parts swiveled toward the left side of the chamber, where the sudden call had come from. Bodies began to part as someone moved through the crowd.

"I am surprised," said the same melodious voice that had belong to the hologram, and a cloaked, robed, and hooded figure stepped through the crowd, coming to a halt maybe ten meters from the speaker's podium. A human hand reached out through the wide sleeves of the figure's robes and drew back the hood, revealing a bald human with a goatee, dark eyes, and an insufferably amused smile.

"I expected you to cut me off sooner, Commander," Kane said, still smiling as he stood within ten meters of the GDI delegation.

The Council Chamber erupted into a hurricane of hundreds of shocked and confused voices.

* * *

Blood ran down the walls in thin rivulets, from where it had splattered and subsequently dried. On the floor of the corridor, it spread outwards in a series of pools around the bodies, lakes that were barely mitigated by the seams in the corridor plating. It wasn't the dark blue of turian, or the orange-yellow of krogan. It actually resembled human blood in color, if not in its texture after having dried.

It was quarian.

_Then again, I suppose seeing seven quarians together is a rarity on the Citadel_, mused the turian as he crouched by the nearest corpse. _Let alone seven _dead_ quarians, all of them armed._

Garrus Vakarian stared down at the corpses, switching vision modes in the blue-tinted holographic visor on his left eye. Forensics hadn't yet arrived, and the officers who'd responded were securing the scene and standing guard; it wasn't uncommon for criminals to try to go back to the scene to clean things up, whether or not C-Sec was there. Down here in the Wards, anything could happen, especially this deep and this close to the base of the skyscrapers.

It only took a few moments to surmise what happened, by analyzing the patterns of exit wounds, the slumped bodies, and the number, positions, and nature of the bullet wounds and holes in the walls. The quarians had been pursued down the corridor, and had hacked the locks in the hallway outside. Witness reports indicated they'd been pursued by armed men with unmarked red and black armor. The troops chasing them had herded them down this corridor, where another group of gunmen – four, he guessed, judging by the number of different types of bullet holes in the walls – had hit them with crossfire. Four of the quarians had died in the crossfire, as they lay where the incoming fire had clearly intersected. At that point the remaining quarians had been killed in an ensuing gunfight; they'd taken cover in doorways and behind alcoves, and had been killed by grenades or suppressing and close-assault fire.

The curious thing was the last quarian. That one lay in the middle of the corridor, and had died from a single gunshot wound to the back of the head – execution style. He'd obviously surrendered, and then been shot at close range.

Garrus saw all of this, and understood it in a calm, detached, analytical way. He kept it that way, because a cold, savage hatred was burning in his lungs. He didn't know the full story of what was going on here; maybe these quarians were pirates or criminals, or maybe they'd just been on a collective Pilgrimage and someone had decided to rob them. Maybe it was just another round of the senseless crime that ran through the veins of the Citadel; it certainly wasn't Omega, but that didn't mean it was safe, and the wards were too big and too complex and too profitable to ever be properly policed.

He hated that, and seeing these dead quarians just made that hate worse. He wanted to find whoever was responsible and make them pay.

Garrus rose and slowly circled around the dead bodies, getting a good look at them with his visor as he moved. He noted modules on some of their armor and suits that were not Citadel brands, but that wasn't uncommon. Quarians made their own equipment, or regularly traded with GDI for equipment or fabrication tech. But some of the modules and equipment they had were definitely not GDI, quarian, or Citadel, nor did they appear to match the various Terminus brands.

One of the weapons was a Werewolf, at first glance. An A72 Werewolf, without registration markings. It was a GDI model, and any quarian worth the air in their suits could wipe the registration on such a weapon, so it didn't mean anything, but this weapon had modules he'd never seen before.

GDI gave the quarians a lot of guns in exchange for their technical assistance in the colonies, but never ones with state-of-the art of experimental modules. Garrus crouched beside it and began scanning it with his omnitool's higher-end sensor functions. A few moments later, he'd gotten a good look at the weapons technology, and his mandibles parted slightly, eyes narrowing.

The module was not a mass accelerator, railgun, grenade launcher, or any other weapon he recognized. It looked like an energy weapon, but not an ion cannon. It resembled . . . .

His scowl deepened, and his mandibles widened half an inch. It resembled a GARDIAN laser, but scaled down and different in construction. Miniaturized laser weaponry, in the hands of some random quarian?

He continued surveying the scene, noting the gear the quarians had possessed. Even the lighter weapons were GDI issue or approved knock-offs of GDI models, but had non-GDI modules mounted on them. Either way, this wasn't normal, and his anger was being replaced by curiosity.

He stopped as he circled the scene, and noticed something, near where the executed quarian lay. Quarian blood had pooled, but in the open, not near where any bullet holes had indicated gunfire. It was near where the second one lay, but Garrus saw that there was no trail leading to where the executed one had been kneeling.

His mandibles twitched.

There had been another quarian there, he realized. A wounded quarian, bleeding, kneeling beside the dead one – and that one had to be alive.

He moved back across the room, searching, eyes flicking across the crime scene, and he found bloody footprints. Some of them were military-style boots, but as he looked closer, he picked out a couple of sets of quarian footprints, as they'd stumbled over or ran over their dead. One set, flanked by boots, led away. The prints were smudged, as if the person leaving it were being pushed or dragged along.

He keyed his radio to the C-Sec frequency.

"This is Spectre Vakarian," he said. "There's a survivor. We need to find them, _now_."

* * *

Udina responded quickly, Shepard had to admit.

"Councilors!" he yelled, jabbing a finger at Kane. "I demand that you arrest this man!"

"Minor tampering with internal communications is an offense that is responded to with fines, not imprisonment," the salarian Councilor responded, his tone dry.

"And I believe we mentioned the lack of an extradition treaty just a few moments ago when discussing Saren's actions," Tevos added, her tone positively arid. "And we have no particularly pressing reason to arrest a man who has committed no crimes in Citadel space."

"Then how did he get in here?" Saracino cut in. "Access to the Citadel Tower is restricted. He obviously broke in if he's standing right there!"

"To the contrary, Director," Kane replied, stepping forward and turning to face both GDI's representatives and the Council. "The Citadel Tower is open to a variety of people, being a major hub of government. Certainly the average citizen cannot simply walk in here, but those who possess clearance can access the tower. For example, diplomats, government officials, military officers, and-" his smile expanded "-the recognized heads of major interstellar faiths."

A few seconds' silence followed that, and Shepard saw the shock on both Udina and Saracino's faces. Beyond them, Velarn shifted in place, and despite the mask-like features of the turian Councilor, she thought he seemed positively smug. Tevos slid into the long silence after a moment.

"The Brotherhood of Nod is a recognized religion, by GDI's own standards, and the Council acknowledges it as well," she said. "Kane is indeed the recognized leader of the Brotherhood, and has been granted diplomatic access."

"Since when?" Saracino demanded.

"Since four weeks ago," Kane replied. "Of course, there was no official announcement. The Council recognizes the importance of discretion. When a belligerent government has a history of violent responses to a religious leader's appearance and assumption of control over his faithful, they understand that sometimes publicizing such an individual's presence, let alone their diplomatic access, is unwise."

Saracino whirled on the trio of the most powerful aliens in the galaxy.

"You gave asylum to a terrorist and the worst mass-murderer in the history of the human species?" he yelled.

"We gave diplomatic access," the salarian replied, "to a human acknowledged by a major interstellar faith as their leader. He is not guilty of any known crimes in Council space . . . save vandalism of a holographic projector."

"And for that I apologize," Kane said, bowing his head to the Councilor. "A fine is a small price to pay for a grand entrance."

"Perhaps," Tevos said, her tone icy. She turned toward the GDI delegation. "Besides the lack of criminal history, the maximum human lifespan is only one hundred and fifty years. It is physically impossible for this human to be the same one that waged war on GDI over a century ago."

"Unless you want to be as irrational as usual," Velarn added. "GDI jumps at any perceived threat, so why shouldn't we expect them to attack their own historical ghosts?"

"My children would disagree that I am a ghost," Kane cut in. "As would I. It is not impossible that I survived for so long. It is just . . . improbable."

His smile grew as he turned toward the GDI party.

"I _am_ Kane," he suddenly declared, his voice echoing in the Chamber's unusual acoustics. "I am the same Prophet who has shepherded the Brotherhood of Nod since mankind built their first mud houses. I am the Prophet who foresaw the arrival of Tiberium, and led humanity into a new age where we survived a sickness and cancer that has wiped out uncounted ones before us!"

He stepped forward jabbing a finger at Udina and Saracino.

"I am the prophet who commanded the Brotherhood in our wars with GDI. I led the bulk of humanity when GDI cast them aside, and I was the one seized the Threshold Tower while GDI fumbled in ignorance against the Scrin, unable to comprehend the enemy they faced.

"And I. _Have. __**Returned!**_"

The Chamber slithered into a torrent of murmurs and whispers as the assembled humans and aliens began talking in the silence that followed. Udina killed his microphone and began speaking furiously to Saracino in hushed tones. Across the gap, the Council members were silently conversing using their podiums' displays. Pressing in from all directions was the flood of alien voices: rapid, high-pitched jabberings of salarians, feminine asari mumurs, the metallic and flanged tones of turians, the filtered voices of volus, and the monotones of elcor and the occasional hanar speaking to someone who didn't communicate visually. Kane took a step backward, smiling. His eyes swept across the chamber, taking in the quiet chaos of the room, and his expression told Shepard that he was reveling in the verbal chaos he'd just caused.

"The Director's Board is going to shit itself," Taylor murmured behind her.

"Not the language I would have used, but I agree," Kaidan added.

Shepard herself wasn't sure how to react to what she saw before her. Kane was a historical boogieman to most of GDI, which was only natural when one was supposed to be dead for over a hundred and thirty years. He'd made a habit of reappearing from the grave every few decades during the various Tiberium Wars, but after a hundred and thirty years even an organization as institutionally paranoid as GDI had begun to relax.

_Well,_ she realized, _up until now._

And more unsettling for Shepard was what she knew about the Brotherhood. They'd been supposedly marginalized, their military gradually disassembled as GDI had relaxed their approach to Nod with Kane's disappearance and after leaving Earth. The Brotherhood was not a united force capable of military action, despite the threats of extremist militants, according to official GDI policy. Shepard knew for a fact just how misguided that notion was, having seen the Brotherhood's military in action personally.

But all she had seen of Nod's military had been humanitarian in nature; they'd saved kidnapped slaves, and had risked exposure to do so. They weren't the monsters that history portrayed them as.

Thus, when Shepard looked at Kane, she only felt uncertainty.

_It doesn't matter what you think,_ part of her piped in. _He's controlling the entire chamber like puppets now._

"You said you were here to warn us," Shepard suddenly called, her voice slicing through the chamber. She strode forward, through the crowd, and her armor did her well, both to push aliens out of her way and to draw attention to her. "About the Scrin and the geth."

The room went silent, but only for an instant.

"Indeed," Kane responded almost immediately, swiveling toward her, as if he'd expected her to speak. It was somewhat unsettling. "I was. I apologize, Commander, the conversation got away from me."

"I agree with the Commander's question," Tevos added. "What warning?"

"GDI is not the only power that has faced attacks from the Scrin and the geth," he stated. "The Brotherhood of Nod has as well."

"What are you talking about?" Udina said. "The Brotherhood is not a power worth mentioning outside of its religion."

"Ambassador, I don't want to accuse you of ignorance," Kane said, condescension tingeing his voice. "You don't honestly believe that all of these independent human colonies in the Terminus and the Traverse belong to non-believers?"

"Of course not," Udina snapped back, color rising in his face at the not-so-subtle snub. "But we're well aware of those colonies' resources. They're insignificant."

"I assume," the salarian Councilor added, "You are referencing the reports of the attacks on Freedom's Progress and New Sarajevo?"

"Indeed, my highly-informed Councilor," Kane said, and Udina frowned, looking to the Council.

"What do you mean?" he asked. "Why weren't we informed of this?"

"The Council doesn't share intelligence information with non-members," the Councilor replied. "If GDI's intelligence networks are not keeping track of what is happening on human worlds in the Terminus and Traverse, that is not our concern." His eyes turned to Kane. "I assume you are referencing the naval actions over New Sarajevo as well?"

"Of course," Kane answered, and Shepard could feel the smile in his voice as he spoke. "Nod's ships were are able to drive off the geth attack fleet, though we were unable to determine their objective." He glanced to Udina, whose mouth was dropping. "Unlike GDI's vaunted navy, we were able to repel the invasion before it could reach the surface."

"Nod hasn't had a viable military for more than a century," Saracino cut in. "You're lying."

Kane turned toward Saracino, meeting his eyes, and then laughed. It only went on for a couple of seconds, but the contempt in the sound was unmistakable. Saracino flushed with anger, while Kane turned back toward the Council, dismissing the Director.

"We are already aware of the attacks on Nod territory," the salarian continued. "But the reports suggested the attacks were large-scale pirate raids, not Scrin or geth fleets."

"The Brotherhood has always been adept at information security," Kane said, eyes flicking toward the GDI representatives, his smile widening a hair. "I can have my agents forward the relevant data and evidence if required."

"That would be appreciated," the salarian replied.

"As noteworthy as this is," Tevos cut in, "the Terminus systems are outside Citadel jurisdiction, and so is the Brotherhood of Nod. We have no reason to intervene."

"I do not ask for intervention, Councilor," Kane replied. "Only awareness. This is a threat far beyond the rather short-sighted disagreement you have with GDI."

"You da-" Velarn started to say.

"This is an enemy that extends beyond mere human interests," Kane continued, cutting him off. "The presence of one of your own within the ranks of our mutual enemy, attempting to abscond with a critical piece of technology, proves that much. The theft of the Tacitus by a rogue Spectre is proof of a threat to both humanity and the Citadel."

Shepard was impressed. It took some serious steel in the spine to cut off the three most powerful people in the galaxy, and while she couldn't read turian facial features very well, the quivering in Velarn's stance echoed human rage quite effectively.

"How did you know about the Tacitus?" Udina asked, and Kane glanced at him, annoyance on his face, then back to the Council. Udina's features darkened further with livid anger.

"We have no reason to accept-" Velarn began to say, but Tevos glanced up at him, and said something that the audio sensors didn't pick up. He paused, glanced to the asari, and his mandibles twitched a couple of times.

"Your words bear wisdom," Tevos said, turning back to Kane. "I will be honest: our mutual conflict with GDI has dominated this exchange with more obstinacy and posturing than rationality. We are better than that."

Shepard caught the subtle censure in her voice, and expected what Udina would say next.

"Yes," the ambassador said, forcing the grudging annoyance out of his voice. "Perhaps we were letting preconceptions get in the way of what was important."

Tevos inclined her head slightly, like a fencer acknowledging a touch. Her words had forced an apology from Udina; if he'd refused to admit he - and by extension the GDI party - were also in the wrong, he would have come off as even more pig-headed than he already had. At least he'd managed to evenly shift the blame onto the Council too.

Which still left Kane squeaky clean in all of it.

The Councilors stepped back to confer a moment, killing their audio feeds and speaking quietly. It took them a few moments, during which time Udina hissed quietly at Saracino. The Director shook his head, gesturing to Kane, who waited patiently. The background murmur of alien diplomats and dignitaries drowned out the voices of the Councilors as they spoke.

"This is bad news," Anderson said, stepping in behind Shepard. "The Board is going to go insane when they hear about this."

"War?" Shepard asked, and Anderson inhaled.

"God, I hope not."

As he finished speaking, the Council returned to their podiums. Velarn looked withdrawn, while the other two aliens were unreadable, and Shepard wondered how they were able to reach an agreement so quickly. Then again, having only three people on the Council meant consensus would be easier to achieve, with only three like-minded individuals making the decisions. Tevos' voice rang out across the chamber.

"The Council has determined that there is wisdom in your words," she said, looking to Kane. "We must take this incursion and the treason of Saren Arterius seriously. The threat presented by both the geth and the Scrin's advanced technology, in the hands of a rogue element with access to the Tacitus' knowledge is too great. To that end, and to improve our relations with GDI, we are offering the Initiative access to Council space and intelligence resources to assist in hunting down Saren. "

The room went silent. Shepard blinked in shock, and Udina and Saracino stared, momentarily speechless.

Kane's smile never wavered.

Udina recovered fast.

"We accept this offer, Councilor," Udina said, injecting respect and gratitude into his voice.

"You understand that such access will be limited," Velarn added quickly. "We cannot allow free military access to either our members' territory or intelligence resources. A limited liaison, however, is reasonable."

"We can negotiate the specifics at a later date, Councilor," Udina said. "But I am appreciative that reason and goodwill has prevailed."

"Indeed," Kane remarked, the faintest tinge of sarcasm in his tone. "It certainly did a few minutes ago."

Udina's face flushed with color again, but Tevos cut him off once more before he could speak.

"Ambassador, we will expect your presence in the tower later today to negotiate on our liaison," she said. "Please come at your earliest convenience. This meeting of the Council is adjourned."

"But-" Udina started, and raised his hand toward Kane. His word were barely audible the Councilor having cut off his microphone feed.

Tevos didn't reply, and Udina's words were lost in the storm of alien voices that followed.

* * *

If Kane was good at making spectacular entrances, he was a master at making unobtrusive exits. Shepard turned at Tevos' words, looking for the bald man, and caught a glimpse of him, pulling the hood up on his black robes. He turned, stepping behind a hulking elcor, and she moved after him.

By the time she circled around the intervening elcor, Kane was a dozen steps away and still moving. She followed after him, trying to keep him in sight. Shepard wasn't sure what she hoped to find by tailing him like this, but her instincts told her to keep an eye on him, as GDI had no intelligence assets inside the Citadel's heart. Anything she could learn about him was important.

She could feel the biotic auras of both Kaidan and Jacob, close by. The other two Marines were following her, taking her lead. She sent a couple of hand gestures, ordering them to watch Kane, and they fanned out through the crowd. She kept her eyes locked on the back of his cowl, and trailed the cloaked figure as he descended the steps leading down from the upper level to the main concourse.

She followed him, and as she watched he strode away from the brightly-lit center of the second level, moving into a dimmer, more private area of the chamber, away from the collected dignitaries. Aliens were moving past her now, partially blocking her view as they departed from the spectacle of the Council hearing.

It took her a few seconds to negotiate the crowd, but she managed to reach the secluded area. As she stepped under the overhang and into the dimmer light, Shepard became acutely aware of her vulnerability and her lack of weapons. Her biotics, at least, would afford her some protection, but she would have preferred a sidearm.

Inside the little secluded area, she could see a few walkways leading over more garden-pits, running to doors that no doubt led to other areas of the tower. The shrouded figure of Kane had come to a halt on one of the walkways, peering down at the garden below. She slowed, and glanced back over her shoulder, to see Kaidan and Taylor still moving through the crowd and trying to catch up to her.

Shepard stared at the back of Kane's head, thinking furiously. A single quick biotic shove could hurl him over the railing, maybe break his neck, and end the threat he presented to GDI - but doing so could cause an international incident of literally galactic proportions. And also, she reminded herself, Kane had just intervened and indirectly negotiated a cooperative venture between the Citadel and GDI. Precisely why, she didn't understand - but she remembered Nod's ships intervening over Elysium, protecting innocents from slavers.

History taught that Kane was the worst monster in humanity's collective memory, but that cynical side of her that had slept with _The Prince_ curled up next to her reminded her that history was not always unbiased.

"That's close enough, Commander," a voice spoke up behind her, and Shepard froze. She recognized Kane's voice, now much closer and quieter, and she glanced back over her shoulder. Kane, still clad in his dark cloak and hood, seemed to emerge from nowhere with a pleased smile on his face.

Personal invisibility cloaking. She filed that important fact way, and glanced over at the cloaked figure she'd been convinced was Kane. The decoy turned around, revealing a human man, with unremarkable features save for having a similar build and height to Kane himself.

"Why the decoy?" she asked, though she suspected the answer.

"A test," Kane replied, pausing about three meters away from her. Beyond him, she saw another pair of cloaked figures, keeping a respectable distance away. Kaidan and Taylor were quickly approaching, and she held up a hand to order them to stay back. They did, confusion appearing on their faces, but they complied nonetheless.

"I wanted to see if you were the stalwart, ever-loyal warrior GDI claimed you were," Kane continued. "Or if you were as intelligent and rational as my associates believed you to be. If the former were the case, you would have thrown my double over the railing and damn the consequences."

"I'm not an idiot," Shepard replied. "I won't provoke an incident between the Council and GDI, not after we just made a diplomatic agreement."

"But GDI propaganda paints you differently, Commander," Kane said, with an approving nod. "Proof that not all claims are true."

"What do you want?" she asked, and Kane chuckled.

"Such an open-ended question, Commander, and one I am not going to answer in its totality," he murmured. "The better question to be asked, is what do you want? Especially considering that you were the one tailing me."

"Maybe I could learn something about you," she replied, crossing her arms. "I've seen vids, read the history books, but the actual man himself is different."

"So, you believe I actually am Kane?" he replied, amusement tingeing his words. "Ambassador Udina seemed almost convinced I was a charlatan."

"You survived a two ion cannon bombardments and an impaling," she said, "and the histories say that you never aged from Stalin's time to the Third Tiberium War. I don't know whether you're actually some unaging immortal lunatic, or just a lunatic who's convinced he is the original Kane. Either way doesn't really matter. You're here and you've just kicked over the biggest anthill in the galaxy. I want to know why."

"There are all manner of responses I could offer you, Commander," Kane replied, his smile fading. "The galaxy is a very dangerous place, moreso now, so I will spare you the cryptic prophecies so many false prophets spin."

He glanced out to the concourse, at the crowds of alien dignitaries and the scattered human presence.

"I did not anticipate what Saren Arterius would do," he said, his words quiet, almost . . . uncertain. "The Brotherhood had intended to acquire the Tacitus once it was extracted from Eden Prime. We were going to use the mutual distrust between GDI and the Citadel to cover up the theft; they would naturally assume the other was responsible. Saren's attack changed that plan and forced me to come out into the open before I intended to."

Shepard frowned as Kane explained.

"Why are you telling me this?" she asked. In response, he raised a hand, pulling back his sleeve, and an omnitool shone briefly on his wrist. A hologram sprung into existence between them, displaying the disturbingly elegant-looking black-hulled vessel that had been at Eden Prime.

"This is familiar to you, is it not?" he asked, and she nodded.

"That dreadnought that Saren was using," she said, and frowned. "I saw . . . Something like that in my dreams after the Tacitus went haywire."

"The Tacitus transmitted information into your mind directly," Kane said. "It has the capacity to do so, though the data was likely unclear, due to both the language that the Tacitus is written in and the damage it received."

She shook her head, frowning.

"Why are you telling me this?" she asked again.

"The vessel in question was not manufactured by any Citadel species, nor the Scrin nor geth nor any other species currently inhabiting the galaxy," Kane said. "It belongs to a species known as the Reapers, a form of synthetic lifeform that destroyed the previous civilization eons ago and then vanished."

"They wiped out the Protheans?" Shepard asked, caught off-guard by what Kane was telling her - and that cynical part of her mind warned her not to take him at his word. Yet at the same time, that name seemed familiar, somehow - yet alien at the same time.

Like the familiarity wasn't something she remembered herself. Was it connected to the Tacitus?

"Why?" she asked. "How? Where did they go?"

"I do not know," Kane said, and Shepard had to blink at his tone, for Kane sounded . . . Troubled?

"The Tacitus would have explained more, if I could have analyzed it," Kane said, shaking his head. "But regardless, Saren and his minions and the ship under his command represent a threat greater than GDI, Nod, or the Citadel. If it were my choice I would not have revealed myself or shown my hand at this point, but events are proceeding faster than I would like."

"Odd, for someone like you who always seems like the maestro, playing everyone else like an orchestra," she remarked, and he smiled. It was bitter and unpleasant.

"The irony is not lost on me," Kane said.

"So, you're just going to give me some vague warning about how dangerous Saren is and how he's flying some ancient superweapon around the galaxy?"

Kane's grin faded, and he shook his head.

"The specifics of the threat before us are unknown," he said. "Beyond the danger presented by Saren and his army." He glanced down at his omnitool, and looked back up.

"A group of quarians entered the Citadel today," he said, and Shepard blinked at the shift in topic. "They possessed information relating to the geth. They are dead now. Someone intercepted them before they could pass on that knowledge."

"Let me guess," she said. "Saren?"

"I do not know," he replied, shrugging. "That information, whatever it may be, is potentially vital to understanding what Saren intends to do." He peered down at the omnitool's display. "There is a Spectre investigating, by the name of Garrus Vakarian. He should be able to help you."

With that, Kane turned to leave.

"Wait, that's it?" Shepard started, and stepped after him. "That's all you're going to tell me?"

He paused, glancing over his shoulder.

"Commander, I just informed you that Nod was responsible for attempting to steal the Tacitus from the Citadel and GDI," he said. "I warned you that Saren has access to technology superior to that of the Protheans themselves. I supplied you with a lead on where you can find more information that will help you find Saren." He paused. "And I admitted that I do not know everything. Be grateful, Commander. I could have ignored you altogether."

He then turned and continued to walk away, his cloaked companions following. After a few moments, Shepard stepped out of the secluded area, and Kaidan and Taylor approached.

"What was that all about, Commander?" Taylor asked. "Didn't expect Kane would stop for a chat with you."

"Neither did I," she said, frowning and watching the Brotherhood's leader as he crossed the concourse. She caught sight of a GDI uniform, and then realized it was Captain Anderson walking toward them. "He gave me a lead to follow up on."

"Not to look a gift horse in the mouth, ma'am," Kaidan said, "But are you sure you should trust Kane?"

"No," she replied, shaking her head. "Kane may have some angle of his own he's working here. I'm not taking his word without verifying it."

"Commander," Anderson called as he approached. "I was looking for you."

"Same here," she replied. "Where's Udina?"

"Trying to argue that the Council should arrest Kane," Anderson replied, scowling and looking back up the stairs. "They're ignoring him."

"Easy to do when they're out of the room," Shepard said, and Anderson nodded. "Anyway, we need to get moving. I've got a lead on Saren, and we shouldn't waste time waiting on Udina and the Council to work out the specifics."

'What kind of lead?" Anderson asked. Shepard shook her head, glancing around the vast room.

"Not here," she said. "The aircar should be secure enough to discuss this. It's sensitive."

* * *

Kane and his entourage descended to the private garage for the tower's visiting dignitaries. A custom-designed aircar was waiting for them, built to his specifications. Kane slipped into the vehicle, with two of his entourage moving around to get in the driver and passenger seat. That last of his companions joined him in the back of flying limousine.

The aircar door slid closed, and it lifted off, rising into the sky and quickly becoming anonymous. Not trusting to chance, though, the modified aircar shimmered once it edged toward one of the airborne traffic lanes, and then disappeared from sensors. It paid to have one's own engineers design personal vehicles.

Kane sat in the backseat, his expression pensive as he peered out the windows at the Wards below.

"Did she believe you?" asked the cloaked woman sitting across from him as she pulled back her hood. Kane glanced up at the dark-haired woman.

"Partially," he replied, and Miranda Lawson nodded.

"How much did you tell her?" she asked, and he shook his head.

"What I suspect she would believe," he said. "She is a skeptic, which I can appreciate. One who forms her own opinions and beliefs. She is wasted in GDI."

"Do you think she's really worth all this trouble?" Miranda asked.

Kane frowned, peering down at the skyscrapers passing below, and did not speak for a while.

"She is just one piece on the board," Kane murmured. "A powerful one, but just a piece. I've given her direction. If she finds what we need, then we shall see what further benefit she will bring us. If she doesn't . . . ."

He shrugged again.

"The loss of one pawn is not the end."

* * *

Shepard felt a hell of a lot better when she'd recovered her sidearm at the weapons-check station outside the garage. A four-seater aircar was waiting for Shepard and Anderson as they entered the garage, only a minute or so behind Kane and his group. Two GDI soldiers in full kit and helmets were waiting by the car. They saluted as the pair approached and opened the doors.

"Alenko, Taylor," Shepard said to the two Marines following them. "We're heading back to the Embassy."

"Understood, ma'am," Kaidan replied. "We'll meet you there."

A minute later, Shepard and Anderson were airborne, the two bodyguards taking the aircar over the Wards. The two officers sat in the back, and Shepard engaged the privacy screen.

"Well, Commander," Anderson began. "What's this lead?"

Shepard told him, keeping it quick and terse. Anderson scowled as she explained the meeting with Kane, his admission that Nod was behind the trouble with the Tacitus, his warning about Saren and the "Reapers" and his lead regarding Vakarian.

"And you believed him?" Anderson asked, his voice quiet and thoughtful. Shepard expected him to be at the very least concerned that she'd spoken with Kane, but he seemed more wary than angry.

"No," Shepard replied. "Not all of it. But I want to verify it. And if he is accepting responsibility for the Tacitus, it might help us mend relations with the Citadel. But only if he tells them himself."

"Right," Anderson agreed. "Without Kane admitting it openly to the Council, they'll just accuse us of shifting the blame. I'll check on our contacts in C-Sec when we get back to the Embassy, and see if we can verify this quarian incident. I'm especially concerned about Vakarian."

"You know him?" Shepard asked.

"Only by reputation," Anderson said, peering out the window. Holographic displays flickered past them as they descended toward the Ward. "He's supposed to be a new Spectre, only been inducted within the last year. A hot-head known for being ruthless at getting the job done. Not dissimilar from Saren."

"Turian?" she asked, and Anderson nodded.

"He could be worse, and reputation doesn't always translate into fact," Anderson added. "We'll find out if we meet him."

Shepard listened to Anderson, noting how he'd spoken Saren's name, and remembered what else Anderson had told her about him.

"What's the history between you two?" she asked.

"It was a little after first contact," he said, and then paused, shaking his head. "I don't want to talk about it. I'm still carrying fragments from that operation in me."

"I understand," she said. They all carried scars. Like her and Akuze. A few moments' silence passed as the car continued across the Ward.

Then Shepard felt Anderson stiffen beside her. She glanced up at him, and saw his hand drifting to his sidearm.

"Captain?" she asked, and her hand started to drop as well.

"We're not headed toward the Embassy," he hissed.

The privacy field fell a heartbeat later, the GDI soldier in the passenger seat whirled around, leveling a large, heavy pistol at her face.

"Hands up, away from the weapon."

* * *

**_Author's Notes: _**Well, that was another chapter that took me way too long to write. Writing properly for Kane is hard - especially in conversation-heavy chapters like this one.

Until next chapter . . . .


	7. Chapter 7: Cowboys

_**Chapter Seven: Cowboys**_

Shepard froze, staring down the barrel of the pistol. It was a heavier, semi-automatic model designed for armor penetration, but not GDI issue. However, even at the extremely close range of the car's interior, the barrel didn't quite extend far enough to reach inside her suit's barriers. The first round would smash into her shields and be stopped flat.

Unless it was a phasic or photon round, which she suspected they had loaded. In that case it would simply lose the majority of its momentum bypassing her barriers, and then cave in her skull. There was a reason assassins and hitmen preferred that kind of loadout.

Beside her, she could feel Anderson tensing up. Options were grim. There was no way she could draw her sidearm fast enough to shoot the passenger. Biotics were too slow and too visible; even a small, quick flex of her power would be accompanied by the characteristic pulse of dark energy and the vertigo of shifting gravity fields. He'd get a shot off before she was a quarter of the way through.

"Unholster your weapon," the passenger said, his voice filtered but distinctly male. That ruled out asari. It also didn't have the guttural resonance of a batarian, either. Human. "Hand it over, nice and slow. Butt first."

She narrowed her eyes, considering. She wouldn't be able to draw the weapon and shoot him – not before he'd get a shot off, and there was no room to dodge in the tight confines of the car. Even if he missed with the first shot, he'd hit with the subsequent ones. But if she could keep his attention locked on her, even for an instant, Anderson could grab the weapon and at least lock it down long enough that she could use her biotics.

Though she did her best to keep her face and body language still and unreadable, the passenger seemed to pick up on her plotting. He shifted in place, leaning a bit back, and pointed his pistol at Anderson. The Captain's uniform didn't come with barriers or any defensive measures beyond standard military ballistic weave. Without a helmet, a single shot from that range would blow his skull to pieces.

The situation didn't present her with any immediate options. She shifted gears, considering the enemy's possible affiliations and motivations. They didn't want her dead, that much was clear; they had access to a GDI vehicle and uniforms, so they could easily have just flown in a drone-controlled car with a bomb, or spun around and hosed the rear seats with a submachinegun.

She slowly reached down and removed her pistol from the magnetic clamp on her thigh. Stalling for time was unlikely to work; Kaidan and Jacob might miss them, but it would be a while, and they'd be less able to track the car the further away it got from the embassy. C-Sec was out of the question; GDI would take a while slogging through the process of getting their disappearance reported and getting a response mounted.

Once they had her weapon, she surmised as she lifted it up, they'd take them to wherever their hideout was, probably using Anderson as a check on her behavior until they could restrain her. Interrogation would likely ensue. The pistol rose, unfolding automatically, and both the passenger and the driver visibly tensed up until she turned the weapon around, handing it butt-first to the passenger.

Whoever this enemy was, if they were kidnapping them for intelligence or as hostages, then she couldn't allow them to be taken; they likely wouldn't survive anyway. If she acted, however, Anderson would likely die. That meant it was either Anderson, or both of them.

She made the decision.

The passenger reached up to take the pistol from her fingers with his other hand. He grasped the handle of Shepard's sidearm and started to pull it back, when her hand darted forward, grabbing his forearm and yanking as hard as she could.

Anderson reacted faster than she expected, twisting sideways. The pistol went off, intensely loud in the cramped quarters. There was the sickening, squishy slap of a round penetrating human flesh, and the smell of blood. Shepard twisted her wrist as she pulled, turning the passenger's own hand and squeezing as hard as she could, while her other arm shot forward, hand flattening into a palm aimed for the helmet's chin. Her armored palm hit and snapped the passenger's head back, and his pistol discharged again, while Shepard's sidearm clattered to the floor.

Then every display in the car exploded.

Glass and plastic and bits of metal careened around the interior of the vehicle, scattering off barriers and scoring against armor. Shepard jerked back as electricity arced around the tiny space, reminding her of the discharge from an overload or other ECM grenade. The car twisted in midair, the driver shouting something in shock or panic, while the passenger fell backward against the door on his side, shaking his head. Shepard spared an instant to glance at Anderson, and saw blood weeping from his left upper arm. He was otherwise unharmed, if dazed by the sudden explosion, and she surged forward toward the passenger, dark energy twisting around her as she prepared to hit him hard enough to splatter him across the windshield.

The pulse of raw force went into the windshield instead, as the car twisted sideways, the blast cracking the transparent barrier. The vehicle tumbled and spun, careening out of control, the driver screaming something about electronics being disrupted. Shepard was tossed against the rear driver-side door as the vehicle spun, Anderson flopping over her, his blood splattering into her face.

Then, out the window, she saw the façade of one of the Ward's skyscrapers rising up toward them, sapients of every shape and size scrambling out of the way before-

They hit. The transparent barriers crashed inward, deforming under the impact and absorbing the energy of the car. Shepard felt rather than heard the crash, shuddering through her body, and was chucked forward against the driver's seat. An eyeblink later, there was another thundering impact, and then . . . .

Stillness.

* * *

" _. . . is now element zero. Confidently: anything is possible when . . . ."_

Pain rolled through her body as Shepard slid back into consciousness. She shook her head, which made the pain worse. She could hear sparking cables, a laboring engine, and in the background, what sounded like an advertisement of an elcor droning on about body wash.

"_Smug: I am on a rachni."_

Shepard pushed off the floor of the car, looking up, and as the passenger-side door was forced open, the armored man on that side of the car kicking viciously in an effort to get free. The driver lay slumped, blood sheeting over his or her torso, a hand-sized shard of glass embedded in his/her throat. Anderson lay beside her, the captain looking as if he'd taken a beating; blood pulsed from his arm wound and he lay unconscious, a nasty welt across his forehead.

The passenger-side door crashed open, and the armored figure scrambled free. She had to make a decision. The driver was down. Not likely to be recovering but not certain. Help would be inbound in minutes, so the Captain would likely survive. She didn't have time for a medigel application. She looked up at the passenger as he scrambled out of the car.

"No," she growled.

Reality twisted around her fingers, and the passenger was lifted off his feet and hurled three meters into a holodisplay showing an absurdly muscular elcor wearing some sort of white loincloth and blue towel draped over its shoulders, sitting atop a big insect-like creature. The man went straight the display, shattering it into a dozen pieces of glass and plastic and thin metal, and went sprawling.

_Now _she had time for a medigel application. It took only a second to open and spread the pack and its associated bandage over the Captain's wound, and once she finished, Shepard scrambled over him. She glanced around for her pistol, but the sidearm was nowhere to be found. Probably had flown out during the crash. She dismissed it and kicked out the rear passenger-side door, then clambered out of the vehicle right as the passenger started to stand. He glanced back toward her, his movements a bit drunken and loose, and then bolted toward the shattered windows of the building.

The jetpack he wore on the rear of his armor flared to life.

Shepard snarled, bolting after him, and her biotics flared up again, blue light coiling around her as she closed. She didn't have the energy or focus to create a powerful mass effect field so quickly after generating the last one, so she settled on making a quick, weak one. Gravity twisted around the passenger as he ran and just as he fired the thruster, he was suddenly spinning around, weightless for a brief moment.

The jetpack fired, but now he was oriented toward the ceiling. He went straight up, spinning wildly in mid-air, and body-planted against the ceiling. He then went tumbling down to the floor and crashed with the impact of ceramic on metal.

Shepard dashed toward him, knowing that without her pistol she was going to have to do this the old-fashioned, dirty way with brutal hand-to-hand violence. In the distance, she thought she heard sirens, and the sounds of incoming aircars.

He was starting to stand again - had to hand it to the man for sheer resilience - as she closed in. He looked up, saw her approaching, and snapped up his pistol. The sidearm flashed - one shot hit her shields, and then she was on him, right shoulder pivoting to lead into a body-check while her left hand rose up, grabbed the wrist of his gun hand, and lifted it up and out. He went tumbling backward, and Shepard went with him. They pitched over a metal bench and a concrete planter, and crashed to the floor on the far side.

He pushed up, his free hand balling into a fist and swinging. Shepard ducked her head, the blow clipping her on the cheek, but she grit her teeth through the jarring impact and pushed down, pinning his gun hand. Her right arm coiled in tight, fending off another punch, and she shoved her forearm down across the man's throat.

He gasped in surprise, free arm pumping and trying to hit her and drive her back, but she pressed all her weight down on her right arm, choking off his air supply. He gasped for a couple of seconds, and then his legs shot up, scissoring around her waist and locking in tight. She blinke din confusion, not sure what he was attempting - the rigid armored plates would prevent him from contracting his legs and squeezing her.

Then his whole body twisted in a single, jerking, spasmic movement to her left. It wasn't enough to throw her off, but it let him rise up, for just an instant.

Then there was noise, and she was spinning around and tumbling through the air.

The flight was brief, only lasting an instant, and as Shepard rolled away, she understood. He'd twisted around to give his jetpack an angle to fire at, and triggered the thrusters on his left side - spinning them both around and allowing him to improvise a leg-toss.

"Clever bastard," she muttered as she rolled up to her feet. He had flipped himself all the way over onto his stomach with the violent, brief burst from his jetpack, and was starting to stand, pistol rising again.

She focused, snarled, and another biotic pulse rushed through her. Once again, Shepard didn't have the focus or energy to create a powerful blow, so she instead focused on making it count. She sent the shove low, the altered gravity hitting him across the knees.

He lost his balance, falling forward and dropping to his knees. His free hand slapped down against the floor to arrest his fall, and he looked up, raising his pistol again.

The tip of Shepard's boot swept up into his helmet's chin, snapping his head back. He fell backward, then his feet sliced out and hit her in the knee of her other leg before she could regain her balance. She dropped to the floor, and immediately planted her hands and feet, pushing back up.

Shepard barely managed to rise to her knees before he body checked her, knocking her to the ground. His free hand slapped down over her face, pushing her head to the ground and the pistol-

_**Thwoom!**_

The man suddenly went limp, his armored body collapsing down onto Shepard, blood and other matter erupting from one side of his hlemet. She blinked in surprise, and pushed the sudden corpse up off of her chest. From there she had a good angle with which to see the neat, bloody hole that had been blown in one side of the man's helmet, and the much more ragged and gory hole on the other side.

Shepard stared for a second, recognizing a well-placed round from a long rifle, and pushed the corpse the rest of the way off her. A shadow fell over her, blotting out one of the holographic lights, and she looked up.

A turian loomed over her, clad in blue-black armor. In his hands he held a scoped carbine, and mounted on the left side of his head was a wraparound holographic visor.

"Shepard?" he asked. "Commander Shepard, I take it?" He reached down, extending a hand toward her. She took it, and the turian hauled her up. As she rose, she could see his face more clearly; the mask-like visage was bare, save for some conservative blue markings along the mandibles.

"Yeah," she said as she rose to her feet. "Good shot . . . ."

"Vakarian," the turian said. "Spectre Garrus Vakarian. And you're welcome, Commander."

* * *

Shepard scowled as the C-Sec medic checked her out. Behind her, the thrumming of an ambulance's engine could be heard as it lifted off, carrying her unconscious Captain into the air to a hospital, a pair of C-Sec armored cars following it in escort.

Garrus Vakarian stood a short distance away, having spoken to the C-Sec officer in charge of the scene. They'd arrived with their usual timely efficiency - less than two minutes after the fact, and set up a perimeter around the crime scene. He suspected that they would have arrested Shepard immediately, if he hadn't been present to essentially tell the police to lay off.

His mandibles tightened against his jaw as he walked toward the crashed aircar. He'd been an officer for C-Sec for a year, after he'd mustered out of the military and following in the footsteps of his father, but the rigidity of the system had grated against his sense of right and wrong. Procedure, he felt, should never stand in the way of action. He'd had countless arguments with his father about that.

When the Council had begun expanding the number of Spectres several years ago, in response to GDI's belligerency and the Verge War, he'd taken the opportunity to join up, and to hell with what his father wanted.

Garrus crouched beside the air car, peering at the corpse in the driver's seat. Clean puncture through the throat from crash-glass. No way the driver had even a hope of surviving. He fired up his omnitool and accessed the car's navigational computer, and found it was locked down with GDI security protocols.

_Interesting_, he thought. _The attackers here had access to GDI encryption_.

Encrypted or not, the data was easy enough to copy. Once he got past the security protocols, he could determine where these two disguised assassins were attempting to take Shepard and Anderson.

His eyes flicked to the two corpses in GDI uniforms. How were these men connected with the dead quarians? And why were they interested in a GDI naval officer and a Commando?

_Well, why don't you just ask?_

Garrus rose and walked toward the sitting Shepard, who was scowling as a salarian EMT was checking her over.

"No apparent injuries," the salarian medic said as he checked her over with his omnitool. "Mild concussion, but nothing that some medigel and rest can't take care of."

She nodded, politely thanking the medic but refusing any of his treatments. He packed up and stood, and backed away as the armored specter of Garrus strode over toward them.

"You picked a hell of a time to show up," she said, rising. The turian nodded, and gestured toward the car.

"To be honest, I wasn't looking for you," he said. "I was looking for them."

"I'm not going to look a gift turian in the mouth," she said, and the Spectre barked out a laugh. "Though this is pretty convenient for us to meet like this. I was getting set to go looking for you instead."

"Why?" Garrus asked, curious.

"I have a lead on one of your fellow Spectres," Shepard said. "Former compatriot, actually."

"Saren," Garrus said, growling, and nodded. "I have to admit, I was a bit elated to hear he'd turned traitor. Always thought he was dirty. What kind of lead?"

"Seven dead quarians," she said, and he slowly nodded.

_And there's the connection. Maybe that year as a C-Sec detective hadn't been all that useless._

* * *

Shepard sat in the passenger seat of Vakarian's car as he weaved through traffic. He moved calmly, almost sedately, as he drove her toward the GDI Embassy. He'd been kind enough to give her a lift, but when he brought up the navigational data on the GDI aircar, she understood why he was eager to get her to the Embassy. They both wanted to know where the would-be kidnappers had been headed, and they both knew that he wouldn't get GDI assistance on the matter without someone to help him get in.

She thought she saw data flicking across the eyepiece the turian wore. She thought about what Kane had told her. It was still hard to believe, even when her guts were telling her that it was true. But the implications . . . .

No. She could puzzle through them later. They had a lead to follow up on, and a turian ex-Spectre to track down and ventilate.

"What's your interest in the quarians?" she asked, and Garrus muttered something. After a few moments, likely spent considering exactly what to tell her, he started to explain. He told her about what he'd found regarding the quarians: the shoot-out, the executions, the wounded quarian taken away as prisoner, and their weapons.

"Okay," she said, after a while. "Sounds like Brotherhood weaponry. You said you were tailing the guys who grabbed us?"

"Yeah," the Spectre said, nodding. "I was fortunate I caught them right after they ambushed the two soldiers sent to pick you up. Otherwise I never would have known they were after you."

"You let them land at the Citadel Tower?" she asked, and he nodded.

"It was a risk, but I needed to find who they were after," he said. "Fortunately, I did."

"How did you track them?" she asked, and he grunted.

"Long story, lot of leads," he said. "Starting from the massacre of those quarians."

"What leads did you have?" she asked.

"None, at first," he said. "The weapons didn't lead anywhere, because there were no serial markings on the shipment and no one on the Citadel that I knew of was moving lasers on that small a scale. Like you guessed, I suspected Brotherhood involvement, but otherwise had no immediate leads. I decided to run down the possibility of mercenaries being hired to hit the quarians. I didn't expect much, but I knew if anyone knew about financial movements on the Citadel, it would be Barla Von."

"Who's that?" she asked.

"Volus financier," the turian said, bringing the car around onto another lane of airborne traffic. "He keeps an eye on important people on the station, tracks money transfers, and works for the Shadow Broker as a free agent. I've used him a lot to get leads I needed."

"What happened?" she asked.

* * *

"_Ah, Spectre Vakarian," the filtered voice said. "What an unexpected surprise."_

_Garrus strode into the volus' spare office, his mandibles widening slightly in the turian equivalent of a polite smile. It certainly wasn't a surprise to the little enviro-suited money mover; if a Spectre was coming to visit him, the volus knew it the moment they set foot on the Presidium._

"_Barla," he said quickly. "I don't have much time, so I'll get to the point. A merc squad was hired today to do a hit on some quarians. Do you know anything about it?"_

"_Blunt as always, Spectre," Barla Von said, nodding. He inhaled on his suit's gas rebreather. "Indeed. Many mercenaries were hired this day, across the Citadel. But that is business as usual."_

"_Do you know who hit the quarians or not?" Garrus asked, his mandibles tightening. _

"_No," Barla replied. He inhaled again, his tri-digited hands moving over the haptic interface of his multi-screen display. "But with some deduction, I can figure it out."_

_Garrus walked around to peer at the volus' screen. Barla Von was not usually worried about what information the turian saw, as most of it was financial coding and graphs that revealed very little to those ill-trained in the arcane lore of accounting. To garrus, it might as well have been hanar acid-glyph-scrawls. _

"_I have records for monetary transfers for seventeen different groups of mercenaries who were hired over the last five days who had the numbers and equipment to hit a group of that size." Inhale. "None of them fit's the profile, however. They received payments or moved off-station before the quarians were attacked."_

"_Then it wasn't mercs," Garrus said, to which Barla shook his head._

"_Not necessarily," he said. His fingers tapped the display, sifting through more data. "I have no financial records as well. Weapons or drug transfers, perhaps. They may have been paid in material, not money." Inhale. A few moments passed. _

_Barla went still, and Garrus blinked._

"_What did you find?" he asked._

"_Saren Arterius," Barla mumrued, his filtered tone curious. "One moment."_

_Data flashed across the display, almost too fast for Garrus to follow it. Of course, even if it could, it was in the damned accounting language and coding he'd never begin to understand._

"_A shell company for Binary Helix made a transfer of weapons, iridium, and element zero to a subsidiary of a Citadel-based mercenary group, the Iron Jaws," Barla said. Inhale. "Transferred by a criminal by the name of Fist. Known associate of Saren and the Shadow Broker."_

"_What relevance does this have?" Garrus asked, curious._

"_The Shadow Broker recently hired a bounty hunter to kill Fist," Barla said, glancing up at Garrus. "Apparently, Fist did something most foolish." Inhale. "For a lot of money, it seems._

"_Transfer occurred yesterday," Barla continued. "Lot numbers for transfer indicate one half of shipment was sent today while the rest remains in a cargo transport in dock."_

"_Half now, half on delivery," Garrus said. "Suspicious, but not proof they were involved in this."_

"_Twelve Iron Jaw agents received payment for services rendered today an hour after the ambush on the quarians," Barla continued. "Credit transfers. They did not move off-station to carry out the operation that got them the payment." Inhale._

"_That can't be coincidence," Garrus said._

"_No," Barla said. "Wait. Checking . . . Interesting. Cross-checking known sellers associated with the Iron Jaws." Inhale. His next words were intrigued. "Ah. They are attempting to find potential buyers for human-made weapons mods. Laser modules, designed for Werewolf-style systems. Looted from dead quarians, I would suppose."_

_Garrus straightened, mandibles twitching._

"_Then I need go pay these mercenaries a visit."_

* * *

"Was that the proof you needed?" Shepard asked. Garrus shook his head.

"Spectres don't need proof," he said. "Just evidence. There's a difference."

"What happened?" she asked. "There's the chance you might have been wrong."

"If I was, I would have ended up killing mercenaries," Garrus said. "No loss to the galaxy anyway, right?"

"Maybe," Shepard said, shrugging.

"But I wasn't wrong," Garrus said, his voice tight but satisfied. "It just took me a while."

"So you went after the mercenaries," she said. "How?"

"I couldn't just walk up to them and ask," he said. "So I did the next best thing."

* * *

_The warehouse wall exploded in with a deafening crash of metal, ceramic, and screaming engines. Debris careened around the room, glass rained from shattered panes, and a cargo hauler plowed into the room. Cargo crates went scattering, tumbling down with resounding crashes and crunching impacts. The hauler, seven meters tall and eight wide, came to a halt._

_The Iron Jaw mercenaries recoiled in shock and surprise. Two of them were sprawled on the floor, hit by flying debris, while the other two went for their weapons._

_Garrus stepped out of the hauler's cab, assault rifle shouldered, and he fired two quick tech grenades, one after the other, from the launcher on his omnitool. Flashes of blue anr reddish lighting played over the two standing Iron jaw mercs, overloading their weapons and suit systems. His assault rifle barked as he strode forward, hitting one mercenary in the knees with two precise shots that dropped him to the floor. The other managed to get a shotgun up, only to find the weapon to be convinced it was overheating._

_Garrus strode up toward the mercenary as he futilely pulled the trigger and beat him across the face with his rifle._

_He walked around, kicking weapons away from prone mercenaries and doling out quick knee shots to those who weren't already blessed with them. Finally, he singled out the senior most mercenary of the group, a batarian, and hauled him to his feet._

"_I'm in a hurry today," Garrus said, meeting both sets of the batarian's eyes. "So I'll be right out of here if you just tell me where the quarians are."_

* * *

"Subtle," Shepard said, and Garrus shrugged. "You find the quarians?"

"They didn't know," Garrus said. "Pity. Would have saved the whole group a lot of trouble."

"What happened next?" she asked, and Garrus chuckled.

* * *

_The warehouse wall exploded in with a deafening crash of metal, ceramic, and screaming engines. Debris careened around the room, glass rained from shattered panes, and a cargo hauler plowed into the room. Cargo crates went scattering, tumbling down with resounding crashes and crunching impacts. The hauler, seven meters tall and eight wide, came to a halt, its front scarred from impact damage._

_The Iron Jaw mercenaries recoiled in shock and surprise. Three of them were sprawled on the floor, hit by flying debris, while the other four went for their weapons._

_Garrus stepped out of the hauler's cab, assault rifle shouldered._

* * *

"Ah," Shepard said. If it worked once . . . . "How many warehouses do the Iron Jaws have?"

"Quite a few," Garrus said, his tone a bit weary. "That group didn't know either."

"What happened next?" she asked. He glanced to her.

* * *

_The warehouse wall exploded in with a deafening crash of metal, ceramic, and screaming engines. Debris careened around the room, glass rained from shattered panes, and a cargo hauler plowed into the-_

* * *

"I get it," Shepard said. "How many warehouses did you crash?

"Six," Garrus said. "That hauler got pretty battered. I eventually got some information I could use from those idiots."

"What did you find?"

"The survivor of the attack was a male quarian," he said. "They handed him over to the criminal who hired them, Fist. They didn't know where he'd taken him, but there was a batarian who did. Name was Dorman Kint. Turns out he was the leader of the mercs in the first warehouse I visited. I figured if I hurried back, I might catch him."

* * *

_The warehouse wall exploded-_

* * *

"_Again_?" Shepard asked.

"I've yet to encounter a potentially dangerous situation that can't be defused by smashing through a wall," Garrus replied.

"Just get the important part," she said.

* * *

_It took Garrus a few kicks to knock open the battered door of the cargo hauler, but he got it open and strode out, assault rifle in hand._

_The warehouse was empty of mercenaries. Across the room was the large hole he'd battered in the wall the first time he'd arrived._

"_Well, shit," he muttered._

* * *

"Turns out one didn't need one's legs to operate an aircar," Garrus said. "So I went after him. Tracked him down through C-Sec."

"You hit him with the cargo hauler while he was airborne?" she guessed, and he scoffed.

"Of course not," he said.

* * *

_Dorman Kint landed his aircar at the lot outside the docks the Iron jaws operated. He clambered out, wincing as he limped across the landing zone. The medigel dulled the pain and had closed the gunshot wounds from the insane turian who'd been hitting their warehouses for the last couple of hours. _

_He'd been in touch with his men, warning them of the turian's involvement, and had sent a message to Fist to alert him as well. He didn't like the human, but he was a business partner who kept-_

_Noise hammered Dint, and he was lifted up and tossed a dozen meters away. He flopped down onto the ceramic surface of the aircar lot, his armor crunching and dizziness sweeping through his body. He rolled a couple of times before coming to a halt, ears ringing and all four eyes blurry. He blinked a couple of times, and looked to his car._

_It was on fire. _

_The ground shivered, as if some powerful hovercraft was nearby, and he tried sitting up. Nausea rolled through him, and he nearly vomited._

_Twelve meters away, a hover tank with C-Sec markings settled to the ground, and the door on the side opened._

_Garrus Vakarian emerged, assault rifle in hand._

* * *

"Being able to requisition any Citadel vehicle has its perks," Garrus added.

"And Dint?" Shepard asked. She had made a conscious choice to stop being surprised by Garrus' antics at this point.

"Talked," Garrus said. "Truthfully, this time. Didn't even need to lift a hand, except to give him some medigel. Disappointing. But he told me where they took the quarian. I paid Fist a visit."

"How many people died?" she asked.

"Fewer than you'd think," he said with a shrug.

* * *

_Garrus stepped over a half-dozen bodyguards, a couple of them still breathing but with ragged, bleeding holes in their legs and arms where he'd been able to place incapacitating shots. Of course, there was no truly "safe" place on a person to shoot (unless one was a krogan) but Garrus had taken pains to try to put shots where fatalities were least likely to happen. Even so, seven of Fist's guards wouldn't be making their next paycheck._

_He strode into the back room of Chora's Den, the club that had until a few minutes ago been a bustling morass of writhing bodies, illegal substances, and bad dance music, at least until Garrus had triggered the fire alarm. Once the civilians had cleared out, he went in, and Fist's guards had opened fire on him._

_As the human saying went, hilarity ensued._

_He was being subtle this time. He didn't crash a vehicle into the building, at least._

_Fist exhibited the same level of wisdom as his guards._

"_Die, you fucking skull-faced Spectre fuck-head!" he had yelled as Garrus entered his office. The human criminal hefted an assault rifle, while auto-defense turrets rose on either side of his spacious desk._

_Garrus exhaled, the noise somewhere between a sigh and a growl, and his omnitool auto-executed a series of EW programs he'd coded that overloaded the shields and shut down the guns on both of Fist's turrets. Garrus raised his rifle and sent a few bursts into either turret, blowing them apart, and as Fist gaped in surprise, Garrus shot him in the knee._

"_Should have spent a bit more on security," the Spectre said as he walked around the desk to where Fist lay, writhing and reaching for his dropped weapon. Garrus kicked it away from his fingers. "At least then, this might have taken some work."_

"_What do you want?" Fist asked, his bravado fading into terror and pain._

"_The quarian," Garrus said, and dragged Fist up to face him. He shifted his stance to make sure Fist's weight was on his injured knee. _

"_I don't know where he is," the human muttered, face contorting in agony. "But I know where you can find him!"_

"_So . . . You know where he is," Garrus said, and Fist let out a whimper of pain. "Where?"_

"_If I tell you, they'll kill me!" Fist protested._

"_Fist," Garrus said, shaking his head, tone amiable. "You already told me you know where they took him, and now you're going to hold out on me?" He put the barrel of his rifle against the criminal's knee. "You've got another kneecap, along with some elbows you really are going to need in the future. After all, you betrayed the Shadow Broker. You're not going to do a good job outrunning his assassins without any knees."_

_Fist continued to wince, but slowly nodded._

"_Okay, okay," he whimpered. "Look, I don't know where the quarian was taken. I just know the guys who I handed him over to."_

"_Who? And what did they want with him?" Garrus asked. He didn't make it into an intimidating snarl; he didn't need to._

"_Some humans, some turians," Fist said. "I know where they are, but I don't know who they're working for, or why they-"_

_Garrus shot Fist in the kneecap. He waited for the scream of pain to die down, which took a moment, and heft the human back up to his feet._

"_Fist, we're all adults here," Garrus said. "Let's not lie to each other. It'll just lead to tragedy for your limbs. I know you're working for Saren. Now tell me why."_

"_The quarians had information!" Fist whined. Garrus glanced down at the pooling blood on the floor. Fist might not last much longer. "Information that could hurt Saren! But there were others besides the group they ambushed. At least one more, who had the data, but they didn't know where she was!"_

"_So they need him alive to tell them where the last one is hiding," Garrus said, nodding. "I see. Where?"_

"_Apartment on Zakera Ward," Fist gasped. He flubbed out the address, his words slurring, and passed out a few moments later. Garrus dropped him to the floor, carefully stepped around the pool of blood, and strode out of the Den._

* * *

"Did you call for a medivac?" Shepard asked.

"Yes," Garrus replied. "I didn't like it, but . . . ." he shook his head. "I headed for the apartment address he gave me. Scoped it out. There were only two humans inside, and after they left I went in, looking for information. Nothing was there; they'd scrubbed the hard drives on their computers. Pulled a copy anyway, I'm going to give that to the techs to see if they can piece anything together. I tracked their vehicle and followed them, and caught up just in time to find them having finished with ambushing your people. Professional hit, no blood, just tranquilizers and broken necks. They stole the uniforms and vehicle. I tailed them, found out they were after you, and intervened."

"You nearly got us killed," Shepard said again, and he shrugged.

"Calculated risk," he said. "Plus, your resistance pushed me to act."

"How'd you do it?" she asked.

"Simple enough," Garrus said. "Omnitool is loaded with specs for several thousand vehicles, including that model of aircar. From there, I could access manufacturer override, hack the remote guidance systems, and force a landing. Simple stuff, really." He chuckled. "Up until you started fighting back. Then I had to blow the guidance systems, and, well, everything else on that car to keep them from maybe killing you, and force it to crash."

"Thanks," Shepard said.

"Is that sarcasm?" he asked, and she shook her head.

"You were trying to help," she replied. "And it was partially my fault."

"Nonsense," he said, shaking his head. His mandibles clicked once. "We all act on imperfect information."

Beneath them, Shepard could see the GDI embassy approaching. Garrus brought the aircar around toward the building's landing pads. As the car descended and settled down, a pair of figures jogged out toward them, clad in full body armor, save for their helmets, and Shepard could pick out the green crystals jutting from Lieutenant Alenko's skin well before they reached the car. The second figure was, naturally, Lieutenant Taylor.

"Commander," Kaidan said as they stepped out of the car. His eyes flicked to Garrus, but she held up a placating hand.

"We got word about the crash," Jacob said. "But they didn't tell us anything else."

"Where's the Captain?" Kaidan asked.

"Hospital. I'll brief you when we get inside," Shepard said. She gestured to Garrus. "This is Spectre Vakarian, he's with me. He'll be working with us."

"Understood, ma'am," both Lieutenants said, at roughly the same time. Kind of uncanny, she thought.

"Admiral Parker will probably want to talk to him anyway," Kaidan added, and Shepard stopped.

Oh hell. She'd forgotten. _Oh hell_.

"What?" Garrus asked. "Who is Admiral Parker?"

"Hell," Shepard said, shaking her head. "I forgot Admiral Havoc was going to be here."

Her mind reeled, remembering everything the Spectre had told her about how he handled things, and then about everything she knew about how Admiral Nicolas Parker V operated, and realized that putting them in the same room would result in . . . well, havoc. On the one hand, there was an elite covert operative whose general approach to problems was apparently "Overkill?" and "Kneecaps!" On the other was a special operations commander for whom orbital bombardment was the first resort, and was unsatisfied when an operation was completed and at least two buildings were not demolished.

Her mind treated her to horror scenarios, where "hostage rescue" and "strategic ordnance deployment" were used in the same sentence. Words like "collateral damage" and "unspecified urban renewal" followed.

"Is this going to be trouble?" Garrus asked, to which Shepard shook her head.

"No," she lied, and wondered if there was some way to avert this. "He might even like you." Which was a terrifying concept.

Admiral Nick "Havoc" Parker V and Spectre Garrus Vakarian in the same room. She suppressed the horrified shudder running through her.

* * *

_**Codex - History - Brotherhood of Nod (General Extranet History)**_

_The Brotherhood of Nod is an ancient human society that claims to have existed throughout human history. Little official knowledge is available regarding their activities prior to the incursion of Tiberium in 1995, though Nod agents claim that they were instrumental in guiding human technological and social development - a claim that is denied by GDI. After the initial discovery of Tiberium, the Brotherhood emerged to the public as a political, economic, social, and religious force, acting to aggressively unify various downtrodden nations in a loosely-aligned coalition opposing wealthier states. Preaching an ideology of self-determination, selfless devotion, and unity, coupled with drawing upon resentment and anger from disaffected portions of the population, the Brotherhood's beliefs spread rapidly. Most importantly, the Brotherhood developed and spread technology to harvest the initial forms of Tiberium, allowing the nations unified under their banner unheard-of economic power. Following the command of a single messiah-like leader known only as Kane, the Brotherhood became a superpower only rivaled by the United Nations and the Global Defense Initiative._

_Military conflict between the Brotherhood and the Global Defense Initiative was inevitable, and erupted within a few years. A series of military conflicts known as the Tiberium Wars rocked Earth, while the planet succumbed to the alien material. Kane himself was reportedly killed three times during the conflicts, only to reappear at the start of each new war. Eventually, by 2049, the Third Tiberium War saw the incursion of the alien Scrin, who were theorized to be behind the Tiberium transformation of Earth. After a massive, devastating war, the Scrin were expelled, and the Brotherhood of Nod were apparently defeated militarily, with Kane having been declared dead once again. Brotherhood armies were disarmed, surviving generals were imprisoned, and the globe was firmly placed under GDI control. The Unified Human Armistice Treaty was signed, which officially disarmed the Brotherhood while still allowing for freedom of religion, and Nod communities were allowed to govern themselves so long as they remained armed only with self-defense forces. Despite the UHAT, periodic acts of terrorism by Nod extremists persisted throughout the next century._

_As humanity expanded off of Earth, Nod followers founded many new colonies throughout the solar system. Though GDI retained nominal authority over these human colonies, the Brotherhood communities remained largely independent. Extremist sentiment grew on many outer colonies, particularly in those on Europa and the rings of Saturn, forcing GDI intervention in 2102 when they were linked to terror attacks on Earth, Mars, and Luna. These conflicts, while not as destructive or as prolonged as the Tiberium Wars, were bitter and bloody._

_After the discovery of mass effect technology on Mars, a Nod pioneering colony on Charon discovered the inactive mass relay apparently hidden in Pluto's moon. During the subsequent expansion rush to get out of the solar system, Brotherhood pioneers claimed and established colonies on many worlds. After the First Contact War ended, many enclaves of Nod humans sought refuge throughout Citadel space, and a mass exodus of Nod followers took place to unclaimed (or in some places, claimed) worlds in the Terminus Systems._

_Currently, there are thousands of Nod enclaves scattered throughout human, Citadel, and Terminus space, ranging from small hamlets to continent-spanning metropoli, though the latter are restricted to human space. Colonies of between ten and a hundred thousand are commonplace in the Terminus, and on some worlds, Nod followers wage open conflict with alien species who claim the same resources and territory. Though GDI alleges that the Brotherhood does not maintain a major unified military force, InOps units maintain a regular vigil over known Nod colony worlds to ensure the UHAT remains enforced._

* * *

_**Author's Notes: **_As you may have noticed, Garrus is a bit...different. This is kind of what happens when you take someone whose solution to uncontrolled crime and restrictive police procedure was to become **_Sniper Batman_** and give him free reign to prosecute crime _his way - without_ providing the baseline sense of restraint that a police force would instill. You get, well, the unholy fusion of turian Jack Bauer and the Kool-Aid Man.

Next chapter, we have quarians, Wrex, Havoc, and _havoc._

Until next chapter . . . .


	8. Chapter 8: Scouting

_**Chapter Eight: Scouting**_

A buzzing sensation jerked her awake. She looked up, blinking sleep out of her eyes, and the still quiet of the room - save the thrumming of the computers in front of her - sent a momentary jolt of panic through her. It took her a second to remember where she was (Citadel, Zakera Ward 229 Blocks, close to "ground" level) and then she felt another burst of panic as she remembered.

Keelah, _I fell asleep!_

Right when he needed her the most, she'd nodded off. Where were her stims? Exhaustion was no excuse, not when Kal's life was on the line! She should have been doing _something_ while the hacking programs had been running the trace and infiltration. Prepping weapons or monitoring news feeds or trying again to get in touch with the Fleet. _Something_ other than worrying.

She rose to her feet, glancing around the apartment. It was dim, but she didn't need good ambient light with her helmet's built-in amplification gear. Aside from a trio of bunk beds, the two large chests where they'd kept most of their equipment, and the computer terminal and holo-displays taking up an entire wall, the room was bare.

She moved across the room, passing the attached but little-used bath (their envirosuits made it largely useless save for dumping) and opened one of the crates. The gear inside was meticulously sorted, and it took her only a moment to find the stimpacks. She took one of the injectors out and slid into the port on her suit's left shoulder. There was a hiss, a prick, and the cloudy fog in her head faded, her heartbeat quickening and everything coming into deadly-clear focus.

Tali'Zorah vas Neema shook her head one last time, then turned and headed back to the terminal. Her hands and eyes flicked over the displays, and she remembered why she'd awoken. The buzzing had been the signal that the processes had finished. She sat down, heart beating even faster in anticipation as she looked over the data, and she correlated it with her memories of the ambush.

She had been coordinating here at the base while the main group had been heading for a meeting with the contact to arrange for the actual transfer of data. She'd suddenly lost contact with the entire group, and had been forced to work through hardline connections to local security networks and traffic observation equipment to locate them.

Thus Tali had watched in helpless horror as her friends were gunned down one by one by the human, batarian, and turian mercenaries.

She'd done what she could to help them. She'd tried sealing doors to cover their escape, to alert C-Sec of the attack, to blow consoles and power lines to distract the mercenaries, but it had been useless. They'd killed everyone, save Kal, who she'd watched them drag off. That had been nearly a day ago, and every second since she'd been trying to find where they'd taken him.

_Except for when I'd nodded off from worry and exhaustion, damn it._

Tali had first tried backtracking the mercenaries' movements from cameras elsewhere, but they'd covered their tracks well, right up until they'd ambushed Kal's group. Most cameras had been jammed as they'd approached, but she backtracked the jammed devices until she'd isolated a garage that appeared to be the origin point. Twenty-three vehicles had entered the garage based on pressure sensors in the surrounding area, four of which had tonnage to carry two dozen mercenaries. None of those vehicles' registration was suspicious, but that meant nothing. Mercenaries on the Citadel, she suspected, were good at covering their tracks and using vehicles with innocuous registration.

And they wouldn't be using that garage anyway for their extraction, if Kal's lessons and training had taught her anything. They would have improvised extraction. She'd run a check on large enough vehicles moving through the area, once again penetrating the Citadel's own traffic monitoring systems, and found hundreds that could have carried two dozen humans and one battered quarian. Traffic control noted seventeen illegal stops in that area over the roughly half-hour long period between the mercenaries' landing, the gunfight, and the escape. Cameras had likewise been disrupted, but only traffic-based ones. She'd found a couple of private security cameras mounted outside the building that had caught a partial view of the mercenaries boarding an unmarked air transport with Kal in tow.

Two hours of work had gone into tracking the transport's ten minute flight, as she found cameras along the flight path and checked their records. The transport's path took them into the factory district on the Ward, where she'd lost track of it. She'd been about to scream in frustration when she remembered that the devices being jammed at the extraction point were all Citadel traffic sensors.

Someone had been inside the Citadel network, disrupting electronics to cover the mercenaries' escape. And if they had been, Tali could follow them.

She'd run tracing programs that she'd coded herself, locating the backdoor someone had used to access those cameras. The tracers then tailed the enemy hacker's path, through proxy servers and firewalls and trap codes and far more complex defenses. It had been long and constant, an automated process that inexorably ran down the routes used by the men who had murdered her friends.

Somewhere in that mechanized pursuit, she'd fallen asleep.

But now she had them. The trace ended at an aircar factory in the manufacturing district on Zakera. The same one the mercenaries had been headed for on the cameras.

Tali rose, and strode toward the second equipment locker. She flipped it open, and peered down at the assortment of weaponry contained within. It wasn't certain that he was still there, or - _Keelah_ - if he was even still alive. She still had a trade to complete, but damn the information deal - she couldn't leave him there.

"I'm coming, Kal," she murmured to herself, and began to load up.

* * *

Shepard led Garrus through the Embassy, flanked by Kaidan and Jacob, the other two Marines keeping a wary and not entirely conscious eye on the turian. It wasn't a case of active mistrust so much as the automatic wariness that existed when tensions between species were naturally high. Even tolerant individuals developed it, and Jacob and Kaidan were among the most laid-back humans she knew.

They moved through the lobby, passing the guards inside, and Garrus' eyes flicked toward them. She glanced up at him, and he turned his gaze back down toward her.

"Two hundred," he said. "Heavy security. Good."

"Guards?" she asked, guessing what he'd meant, and he nodded. "How do you figure that?"

"Six-man squad at the entrance, six-man unit inside as response force, six men inside the lobby. Six more on the rooftop, and I assume six to twelve more scattered throughout the building. That makes a full platoon, three shifts a day makes for three platoons, plus an additional response platoon on alert inside the embassy in case of attack. Company-strength force, add in additional platoons for relief, working during leave time, and a reserve for emergencies. And increase those numbers because, well, you're GDI. So I estimate two companies' worth of troops assigned to guard the GDI Embassy."

He peered down at her.

"How am I doing?" he asked, and she nodded.

"That's a good guess," she replied. After all, she couldn't _tell _him how many guards the Embassy actually had.

Garrus let out a bark of laughter, and she knew he'd caught her meaning.

"Commander Shepard!" came a call from the upstairs balcony for the lobby, and she looked up. Her heart sank as she heard the voice, and visually confirmed the incoming threat.

Striding down the steps came Rear Admiral Nicholas "Havoc" Parker V, a grin on his face and arms held out like a grandfather about to hug his children.

The Admiral took after his ancestors: strong jaw, short brown hair that was edging toward grey, sharp and solid cheekbones, and a blunt nose that had probably been used to catch falling aircars somewhere in his youth. He was also clad in Marine armor, which was at odds with how a lot of GDI officers dressed, as they preferred their garrison or naval drabs. But then, Admiral Parker was a special case. One didn't get to be the Rear Admiral in command of GDI Special Operations without proving to be both capable and a bit eccentric.

The Admiral came from a long line of warriors who had served the Global Defense Initiative since the organization's inception back in the 20th century. _Badass Weekly _had done a month-long special on the Parker clan, exploring the distinguished, mayhem-strewn lineage and service of the family. Most, if not all, of said service had involved explosions of one kind or another, and the Rear Admiral had served as a Commando before taking on his position as GDI's head of special operations.

"Admiral," she replied as he came down the stairs, lowering his hands.

"Heard you were hit on the way in," he said, and held out his hand. She shook it. "Glad to see no puissant assassins could take down one of my Commandos, huh?"

It got a bit hairy there for a minute, sir," she said, and he nodded. His eyes tracked up to the turian Spectre next to her.

"I don't believe we've met," Parker said, extending a hand to Garrus, who took it as well.

"Garrus Vakarian, Special Tactics and Recon," he said, and Parker's grin returned.

"Ho, shit, a Spectre!" he said, laughing. "Not everyday I get to shake a hand with one of you guys!" He turned back to Shepard. "Okay, I'm not usually in this position, but I have no idea what's going on. Heard about the ambush, but nothing on why. Help a poor dumb Rear Admiral out?"

"Not here," Shepard said. Parker grunted.

"Briefing room," he said. "Follow me."

* * *

He lay back in the hospital bed, drifting on painkillers. They'd administered them a while ago, and they were starting to wear off, but she still floated on a gauzy wave of light pleasure. The autosurgeons had removed the slugs from his knees and patched them back up, and a blood bag was set up to replace what he'd lost. He'd spent the last couple of hours drifting in and out of consciousness.

"'ello, Fist."

His eyes opened suddenly, adrenaline fighting against the painkillers, and he jerked his head up. He recognized that voice, and the distinct, gravelly accent.

A human slouched in the doorway of the ICU room he lay in. He wasn't terribly remarkable, save the hideous scars running ripshod across the rough skin of his face, intermixed with the inevitable wrinkles of age. He had close-cropped, graying hair and mismatched eyes, one the result of getting a significant chunk of his face blow off. Both eyes gleamed, however, alert and dangerous. Despite the slouch, his civilian attire, and apparent age, Fist knew the man was quick as lightning. Fist inhaled sharply, heart pounding.

"Massani," he gasped, and reached for the nurse call button. And shouldn't there be a guard outside?

"You've been a very stupid man, Fist," the Zaeed Massani said, casually walking into the room. "The Shadow Broker is rather unhappy with your services of late."

So unhappy that he'd arranged for the ICU to be empty when Zaeed had arrived? Fist fought down the panic he was feeling as the mercenary walked up beside him.

"Paid me a lot of money to head all the way here to the Citadel," the human said. "Damn expensive, I said, but I don't turn down good money." As he reached Fist's side, the mercenary leaned over into the cabinet beside the bed and pilled out a big, fluffy pillow.

"Hm. Suppose the Broker must have had a thing for those quarians," he mused.

"Please, I didn't-" Fist started.

"Spare it," Zaeed said. "You haven't got long anyway. Let's keep the time we have economical." The mercenary reached down to his waist and drew a long, wicked knife. He set it on the table beside the bed, and put the pillow down next to it.

"You gave the quarians to Saren," Zaeed said. "I need to know where they took them, and what they know now." He stared down at Fist, the criminal shaking almost violently with terror at the calm, casual killer looming over him. A single sharp, deadly eye glared down at him.

He gestured to the knife and the pillow.

"Your call on which one I use," Zaeed said.

Fist closed his eyes, and slowly, his voice stammering, he told Zaeed everything he knew. Everything about the deal he'd made with Saren, how he'd turn over the quarians and the data which was supposed to go to the Shadow Broker instead, and where they'd taken the quarian survivor. He told Zaeed everything he'd withheld from the lunatic turian who'd kneecapped him and left him in this position: force composition, layout, weapons and gear, and so on.

"That's everything," he whispered.

"Hm. Suppose it will have to do," Zaeed said, and picked up the pillow. Fist closed his eyes, and let the painkillers take him.

* * *

The GDI embassy had plenty of rooms secured enough for sensitive conversations or briefings. Admiral Parker led the motley group down to one of the high-security rooms, which outwardly resembled a lounge and hid an array of counterintelligence equipment that effectively made the room a blank spot on the Citadel's emissions net. Not even the Keepers could get inside.

They stepped inside the room, and Shepard noted a couple of desks, some couches and chairs of varying configurations for various species, and a large, wide holographic display table in the center.

"Okay, Commander," Admiral Parker said, walking over toward the table. "Lay it on us."

She nodded, and Shepard went over everything they'd learned thus far, starting with Kane's warnings about the Reapers and the hints that the quarians had information on Saren's plans to the attempt on her and Captain Anderson. Garrus added what he'd learned, and as she'd feared, the Admiral's interest had grown when the Spectre described how he'd gone about gathering his information, one act of property destruction at a time.

"Like the way you work, Vakarian," Parker said, and Shepard shook her head. Of course he would. He glanced back to Shepard, a pensive frown spreading across his face.

"Commander, you sure about the info from Kane?" he asked, and she nodded.

"He seemed to be on the level," she replied. "I don't think he was lying, and he honestly seemed worried to me."

"Okay," Parker said, nodding. "If you say so, Shepard."

"That's it?" Garrus asked. "No offense, but you're just going to go based on her word?"

"I've known Shepard since she was a recruit in the Commando program," Parker replied. "And she's a Commando, too. There's no one who I'd trust more." He leaned back from the display table, crossing his arms. "So, Spectre, I gathered you know where these guys are operating out of?"

"Aircar factory on Zakera Ward," Garrus replied, nodding.

"Then let's get the bastards."

"I hope we have a more concrete plan than kick in the door and shoot everything that moves," Kaidan said.

"Oh, we'll shoot more than that, Lieutenant," Parker replied with a grin. "But yeah, we need a plan before we go in there."

"Here's the schematics," Garrus said, tapping his omnitool. A moment later, the display shifted to show a three-dimensional image of the factory built deep into the Wards. They leaned over the image, and Garrus tapped a couple more keys, making the image transparent.

"Standard layout," Garrus said. "Most of the facility is given over to storage of output. Three large warehouse areas for containers. Manufacturing zone here, beside receiving. Freight loaded onto interior shuttle system that transports to the port complex. Lower-level maintenance access here, upper-level access here. Office section here."

The layout matched Garrus' description. Shepard noted the maintenance areas in particular, a latticework of tunnels above and below the warehouse and manufacturing area would allow easy access to the rest of the facility, which would naturally mean that the defenders would have those areas heavily monitored and secured.

"How'd you get the schematics?" Shepard asked.

"Official Citadel records," Garrus replied. "There's a possibility they've been altered, but it's unlikely, especially in that lower maintenance area. The Keepers don't like it when someone makes changes to those areas, and whoever did it generally only finds out when their secret tunnels have been replaced by the original designs."

She frowned and then nodded. The enigmatic caretakers of the Citadel were a factor she hadn't considered. The ancient little biomechanical creatures that handled the day-to-day operations that kept the Citadel running had a tendency to remodel structures with little to no warning or explanation. Naturally that would extend to the honeycomb of maintenance tunnels and passageways running throughout the station itself.

"Force composition?" Parker asked.

"Uncertain," Garrus replied. "Fist said at least two dozen mercenaries, though none of them were part of any official group. Freelancers for the most part. Humans, batarians, turians. Ex-Blue Suns, mostly, or Eclipse."

"Expendable, you mean," Jacob said, and Garrus nodded.

"Saren prefers them that way," he said.

"Main ingress," Havoc said, pointing at the receiving area.

"Yeah, if you want to kick in the front door and let everyone know you're coming," Jacob said.

"Exactly," the Admiral replied, without a hint of irony.

"There have to be less suicidal entry points," Shepard said, and Garrus nodded.

"I agree," he said. "Without prepping the area first, we'll be walking right into enemy fire."

"Well, yeah," Havoc said. "I wasn't planning on just _walking _in. An anti-tank charge to blow open the doors, pepper the interior with anti-personnel, and _then_-"

"We really don't have the manpower," Shepard said, trying to prevent the upcoming storm of hilarity from ensuing.

"I could pry away a platoon or two from the Embassy guard detail," Havoc said. Garrus nodded.

"I can get them cleared to move without C-Sec interference," he added. "Maybe bring in a few Special Response units to back us up, but C-Sec procedures will bog that down."

"You're talking about thirty to sixty extra troops," Kaidan said. "Don't you guys think that's a little excessive?"

Admiral Parker and Garrus stared at him as if he'd just told them to dip their sensitive areas in liquid nitrogen.

"The Lieutenant has a point," Shepard said. "It might be better if we keep them on reserve, but we'll probably be more successful with a small strike team. They may simply execute the quarian if we barge in with a cargo hauler, AP charges, and fifty assault weapons blazing. Not to mention that the fewer personnel we involve will likely mean fewer security leaks."

"Nod does know about what's going on, sir," Jacob added, and that elicited a scowl worthy of the hammiest holo-movies from Parker.

"Good point," he agreed with a sigh. "One platoon, then."

"We'll keep the platoon as a reserve," Garrus said, and Parker nodded.

"So, no Wolverines," he said, and Garrus shook his head.

Shepard prayed the Admiral was joking.

"So here's the plan," Shepard cut in, hopefully before Parker could come up with any more ideas that would likely involve "fire" and "industrial district" in the same sentence. "Myself, Alenko, and Garrus should ingress through these maintenance tunnels into the factory. There's an access point from the Keepers' maintenance passages here. Alenko?"

"I'll need to see what security they have on that access point," he said. "Assuming we're not dealing with military-grade security, it shouldn't be hard to bypass."

"Good enough," Shepard said. She looked up to the turian Spectre, but he simply nodded.

"I'll have your back, Shepard," he said, and she nodded. In truth, while she did want his rifle covering her, she was more worried about keeping the Spectre where she could see him. Leaving him outside the factory on overwatch would just give him ideas.

"Taylor, I want you on overwatch outside the factory. Find a good spot to watch the entrance from. If anyone makes a run for it, take them."

"Yes ma'am," he replied.

"Marines will be on reserve," she continued. "Should we have to hit the panic button, they'll come in through the front, and clear the factory." Which meant "kick in the door and kill everything with excessive prejudice." She really, _really _hoped that wouldn't be necessary.

"Admiral, can you coordinate us?" she asked, and he nodded immediately.

"Sure thing, Commander," he replied, and she did her best to hide her sigh of relief. Having the Admiral coordinate from the Embassy would minimize the amount of damage he could do.

"Garrus, how long will it take you to liaise with C-Sec and keep them off our backs?"

"Give me a couple of hours. I'll need to contact Executor Pallin and give him my authorization, and he'll need to filter those orders through the rest of the police." His mandibles twitched. "Pallin won't like it, but he won't have any choice with a Spectre giving the orders."

"I'll need a couple of hours to get the off-shift Marines brought in," Parker added. "And another couple to arm and brief them."

"Five hours then," Shepard said, and they nodded. "Okay then. We'll move out to get the quarian in five hours."

* * *

Tali located the access point between the Keepers' passageways and the maintenance tunnels beneath the factory easily enough; the information was on a public database with minimal security. Actually getting there unseen, finding her way through the tunnels, and locating the access point was another matter altogether.

Fortunately, once she found it (the access panel covering the controls for the doorway was quite cleverly hidden) Tali found bypassing it to be relatively simple. The security software and hardware were both better than what the average mercenary group could afford, which made her think someone higher-up might have been sponsoring this group and directing their actions. That worried her more than a little, but it didn't change the situation. Kal was trapped somewhere in there, maybe dead, maybe alive. But she was going to find him and get him out, no matter what it took or who she angered.

The tricky part was avoiding alerting the security VI that was obviously monitoring the door and other security systems, but that was handled by simply isolating the test signals the VI received whenever it queried the door and faking them, then unlocking the door by bypassing the security codes. It took her all of seven seconds to unlock the door.

Tali deployed a small camera drone around the corner, no larger than one of her fingers, and scouted the room beyond. The passage was empty, and she slid inside, closing the door but leaving her bypass in place so she could easily escape.

She moved through the tunnels, constantly conferring with the map displayed on her HUD to make sure that she was heading in the right direction. She didn't know where they were keeping Kal, but there would doubtless be someone who knew. She tried tapping into the local wireless network, and found it securely encrypted; she started up decryption programs but suspected it would take hours at best, even for her gear. Better to try to find an enemy communicator and patch in directly.

There was a blip on her HUD as her suit's sensors picked up an enemy power source strong enough to generate a kinetic barrier. Tali immediately deactivated her own barriers and tapped a couple of keys on her omnitool. A heartbeat later, she disappeared from the visible spectrum.

Being a quarian with ready access to technology from both sides of the human spectrum had its perks.

"_Stealth system engaged," _muttered a mechanical voice in her ear, making her frown in annoyance. There were also downsides to co-opting Nod technology, like that irritating voice that she couldn't turn off. She was going to have to modify the coding when she got time.

Tali advanced carefully down the corridor, listening, and could hear voices speaking around the next intersection. She put them at maybe forty meters away. She moved as quietly as she could, and a few moments later reached the intersection. She peered around the corner, and spotted two human males in green and gray body armor. They were walking down the passage toward her intersection, talking quietly, and she noted they both had standard-model assault rifles - not shapechanger guns, which was a relief.

Her helmet had standard-issue audio enhancers, and she turned them up.

" -ucking crazy-ass Spectre is the rumor," one of the humans said.

"Those Jaws were morons anyway," the second voice. "And why are we down here? Thellar just came on the radio and barked something about securing the maintenance tunnels."

"Boss said word came down from the relay that we're to go on alert," the first human said. "He's taking this loony Spectre seriously. Worried about someone breaking in to get the quarian."

"Shit, they used the relay?" the second asked. "That's . . . isn't that serious? The commander never used the relay."

"No kidding," the first said. "Boss is seriously worried about someone breaking in. GDI, Nod, Spectres, maybe even quarians or Shadow Broker."

"Better if we could just dump the quarian and clear out," the other muttered. The two were drawing closer, enough so that Tali pulled back from the corner and moved down the passage. "Way too much attention."

"Yeah, but until he tells us where the other one is, we're stuck," the first human said.

"Nantz could make him talk," the second said. "Give us all a biology lesson in the process, too."

Tali's heart began to pound harder. Kal was still alive!

"Yeah, and probably kill the quarian before he could say anything," the first human said. They stepped into the intersection. "Till the boss says otherwise, the suit stays on. We're just using drugs for now. Safer that way. Just leave him sealed up in that office until he's ready."

They started moving up the corridor, opposite the direction where Tali was crouched, and she advanced past them. She considered trying to take them out - they might find her tampering with the door - but decided against it. It would be too risky and too noisy to try.

Plus, she had confirmation that not only was Kal alive, but she also had a decent idea of where to find him.

She just had to locate the offices, find Kal'Reegar, and get him out from under the noses of dozens of heavily-armed mercenaries. Simple enough.

* * *

It took slightly longer than Garrus' and Parker's estimates to get the entire team ready. Garrus had some difficulty getting C-Sec to agree with his order to stand down and clear out around the factory district, while Parker had to "kick some asses repeatedly" (his words) to get a platoon together. Shepard briefed 1st Lieutenant Durant, the officer heading up the reserve platoon of Marines; fortunately the briefing was relatively short, considering the amount of details they still had to work out.

From there, it was onto the transports to Zakera's factory district.

The approach to the factory was uneventful, and they reached their ingress point to the Keepers' tunnels without incident. They had to land at "ground" level, where the actual structure of the station's arms met the vast latticework of construction that made up the station's buildings and skyscrapers, and delved into the surprisingly clean and well-lit tunnels that ran through the station arms.

In the meantime, Jacob parked his aircar a few hundred meters up and started watching what happened below, while four unmarked transports loaded with Lieutenant Durant's Marines found unobtrusive spots to park and wait for the panic signal to drop the hammer. As planned, Rear Admiral Parker remained at the embassy's secure conference room with a couple of aides to coordinate, which as far as Shepard was concerned minimized the risk that he would spontaneously blow up a couple of buildings.

Shepard took the lead in the tunnels, with Kaidan behind her, submachinegun at the ready. Garrus brought up the rear, watching their backs. Though they were still nominally inside "friendly" territory there was always the outside chance of an ambush, so all sectors had to be covered. It wouldn't do for them to run into the one group of savvy mercenaries who went the extra kilometer to secure their base.

They slid through the low tunnels, following the maps Garrus had given them, and within twenty minutes they had found the access point marked on the map. Kaidan moved up and crouched beside it, omnitool flaring up. He went to work, data scrolling across both his haptic display and the HUD on his helmet's visor.

"Good security here," he reported. "Might take me a minute."

A tense few moments passed as the Lieutenant worked on the lock.

"_Commander," _Jacob cut in over the radio. _"We got some drones buzzing around the factory out here."_

She looked up from where Kaidan was working.

"Sentries?" Shepard asked.

"_Not clear," _he replied_. "Not gun drones or anything like that. Trying to isolate their frequencies, but there's a lot of ambient traffic. I don't think they're with whoever is inside that factory, but I can't say for sure."_

"Fist was working with the Shadow Broker before Saren co-opted him," Garrus said. "Might be Broker drones."

"Commander," Kaidan called, and she turned to him, crouching beside him. The mutant's face was scrunched up in concern, but he seemed more curious than troubled. "This is weird."

"What?"

"Someone's been through here already," Kaidan said. "Accessed this door and ran a bypass. Managed to trick out the security VI too, and installed a backdoor allowing them to escape."

"How recent?" Shepard asked.

"Last hour or so," he said. "Whoever it was did pretty good work. Went through the door in seconds. I've never seen anyone bypass security like this so quickly."

"Can you get through?" she asked. In response, the door slid open.

"Fairly sure," Kaidan said, standing. Garrus was already at the door as it opened, assault rifle raised, and Shepard followed him. They moved into the corridor beyond, rifles sweeping and covering both directions. Kaidan followed.

They advanced down the corridor beyond, Shepard leading the way to the office section of the factory. That was the most likely place where the mercs were hiding the quarian, out of the way of civilian workers who would be in the plant or storage area.

A blip appeared on Shepard's HUD, and she held up a hand to halt. The others paused. The contact resolved itself into two contacts in a corridor running parallel to theirs, with power signatures and element zero cores indicative of two human-sized individuals in standard armor. They were moving parallel to Shepard's team and showed no signs of having spotted them.

"You see that?' she asked, and Kaidan nodded.

"Two contacts, average-grade gear, next corridor," Garrus said quietly. "We should take them now."

"Agreed," she replied, and Shepard moved down the passage to the corner. She waited for the enemy troops to walk around the corner into the intersecting hallway, and she could distantly hear them talking.

"Kaidan and myself will pull them," she said. "Garrus, drop their shields with ECM."

They nodded, and on Shepard's signal, they rolled around the corner.

The two guards jerked to a halt. Their gear had standard thermal, electromagnetic, and low-light vision gear, but didn't have the sensors that the higher-end suits that Shepard, Kaidan, or Garrus carried. Thus they hadn't detected the element zero cores or energy signatures of the trio's suits. The ambush that came around the corner caught them completely by surprise, but to their credit their weapons were already shooting up to a ready position to open fire.

They weren't quite fast enough.

Their visual displays erupted in a shower of screaming ECM as Garrus launched a precisely-calibrated tech grenade from his omnitool between them. While they were reeling, Shepard and Kaidan unleashed their biotics, dark energy swirling around them. The mercenary on the left flew straight up, hitting the ceiling as gravity changed directly beneath him. He struck the ceiling panels and stayed there, pinned in place by Shepard. Kaidan, meanwhile, simply yanked the merc on the right off his feet, sending him flying toward the trio in a very slow, very gut-churning somersault.

Several rapid bursts of gunfire ripped down the corridor as the trio opened fire, and the mercenaries' shields, already depleted from Garrus' tech grenade, were torn to pieces. Round punched through armor, and blood dribbled out onto the deck. A moment later both mercenaries fell to the floor, released as the biotic fields faded. The corpses did not stir.

Shepard led the way, stepping around the corpses. She paused at the next corridor, checking, and then continued, Kaidan and Garrus following.

They made good time, thanks to Garrus' maps, and were a few minutes away from the office section when Jacob burst onto the radio.

"_Commander!" _he yelled. _"We've got incoming!"_

"What?" she said, dropping to a crouch almost by reflex.

"_Incoming aircars!" _Jacob warned, and Shepard keyed herself into the feeds coming from his sensors.

A moment later, the entire factory shuddered.

* * *

"_ETA sixty seconds."_

Zaeed Massani heard the VI's announcement, the words matching the display indicating how long he had to reach the factory. He leaned back in his chair, eyes moving over the displays once again, seeing the various sensor feeds from the drones he'd dispatched. Nothing had changed, save a suspicious-looking car that had paused outside the factory, hovering a few hundred meters up.

He double-checked to make sure both his own transport and the small aircar moving ahead of it were still following their preprogrammed route, and then closed his eyes. Before combat, most men got jittery, due to adrenaline and anxiety. Zaeed, however, had seen so much action across the stars that he no longer felt that way. Before combat, he just felt…calm. Peaceful.

Maybe this would be the brawl that got him killed.

He wouldn't know until he was neck deep in it.

Zaeed opened his eyes, right before the VI reported the ETA was now thirty seconds. He leaned forward in his chair, stretching his neck. His heartbeat began to intensify, and adrenaline began pumping through his body, in anticipation of the coming chaos. But there was no emotion beyond that chilling calm.

He watched the displays as his heavy lift transport and the small aircar circled around one factory structure and began descending toward the aircar facility. He saw the wide, open receiving area, a few transports parked in front. He saw the big, wide titanium doors that would normally slide open to accommodate incoming parts or materials.

And as his transport slowed and turned, descending toward the front doors as if to drop of equipment, Zaeed saw his little aircar and the half-ton of crude but effective explosives loaded onto it crashed through those doors.

The detonation blew the doors inward, bending titanium and shattering ceramics and hurling hunks of metal into the warehouse beyond. On the receiving platform, transports were knocked sideways and crates of parts and material were sent hurtling into the air. Zaeed's own transport buffeted in the overpressure wave, and he could see flying sparks from smashed electronics and erupting fire from inflammables inside the factory itself. The sudden burst of fire was throwing up a sheet of light and heat that scrambled his thermal and visual sensors, but he could see movement of humanoid figures beyond the inferno as the enemy reacted to the sudden assault.

Zaeed exhaled, clenched his fists, and rose as the transport settled down in front of the doors. As he stood and turned toward the door, he could hear the faint pumping of hydraulics and whining of servos. For a moment, he considered simply punching off the doors of the transport to make an impression on his opponents, but dismissed the idea as impractical. He needed the transport intact if he was to extract the quarian. Instead, he opened the doors with a press of a holographic key, and stepped outside.

The meter from the rear bay's lip to the platform wasn't very far, but it was enough that when his feet hit the platform, the ceramic cracked from the weight and force of impact. He turned toward the doors, tracking targets on his sensors, picked them out. He leveled the weapons mounted on either forearm, and started forward.

Zaeed Massani was a damned dangerous man, famed for taking down biotics, krogan, and asari commandos., as well as sundry ordinary soldiers, thugs, goons, bounty hunters, mercenaries, armored vehicles, aircraft, naval vessels, the occasional starship, a space station, and one very unlucky dirigible. He'd even been featured in _Badass Weekly_, and that was a publication with _standards._ But he wasn't badass enough - or fool enough - to take on a few dozen heavily-armed mercenaries in their own territory by himself.

But that was why Zaeed Massani cheated. That was why he used a car bomb to open the door, and it was why he was stomping through the front gate of the enemy stronghold in a suit of REV12-Wolverine mechanized armor mounting a triple-barreled armor-piercing mass accelerator and a four-shot, rapid-reloading rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

It was only prudent.

* * *

"Commander," Kaidan said, watching the feeds from Jacob's position, "Tell me I'm not hallucinating?"

"You are indeed seeing the unbridled truth, Lieutenant," Shepard replied. "That's a Wolverine. REV12, modified for close-quarters combat."

"That's not the Admiral's doing, is it?" Kaidan asked. Shepard shook her head.

"He would have warned us," she replied. "This is someone else."

On the display, they saw the Wolverine stomping toward the entrance. A pair of mercenaries, a human and a turian clad in gray and green armor, pushed through the smoke and fire with rifles raised. They advanced far enough to see the approaching assault mech, and they immediately came to a halt, then whirled and fled in abject and well-advised terror.

The Wolverine didn't let them get to safety. The rocket-grenade launcher on its right arm rose and pumped out a quartet of missiles the size of a human thumb that streaked toward the mercenaries. They struck and exploded, releasing bursts of shrapnel the same size as mass accelerator rounds. One or two such grenades were easily survivable thanks to kinetic barriers, and combat armor could protect against some additional shrapnel, but four grenades were too many for both the shields and plating of the mercenaries' low-grade to protect against. Both mercenaries were blown to pieces as the grenades tore through their bodies.

Others started to fire out the doors, streams of tracers and modded ammunition types spraying out through the flames and twisted metal. Most of the shots were random or blind-fired through the smoke and obscuring heat, and a few skipped off the mech's shields as it stomped forward. The mass accelerator on its left arm rose and began firing long, controlled bursts, tracking each shooter back to their position. White-hot thermal sinks ejected every couple of seconds.

The Wolverine plunged through the fires and smoke, weapons blazing, and carnage ensued.

"Impressive," Garrus murmured.

"Shit," Shepard muttered. "Move!" She started up the corridor, and Kaidan and Garrus followed. They had to get to the quarian first, before the lunatic in the mech beat them there.

* * *

_**Codex - Ships And Vehicles - Starships: Supercarriers**_

_GDI supercarriers represent the adaptation of previously-existing land and naval doctrines to space combat. On Earth, combat revolved heavily around control of tiberium nodes and fields that were used to provide local supplies for ground forces. In doing so, GDI and Nod shattered previously-existing notions of logistics trains over hundreds of kilometers; instead a base within a few kilometers could supply any force locally without needing support._

_Supercarriers are enormous vessels that are comparable in size to Glacier-class dreadnoughts, and adapt the existing GDI/Brotherhood doctrine of unlimited local supply to space operations. Supercarriers are largely based on the MCVs (mobile construction vehicle) and MARV (Mammoth Armed Reclamation Vehicle) used in surface warfare, but adapted to fulfill a similar role in space. Supercarriers deploy to resource-rich systems in contested zones and rapidly break down local resources (most commonly asteroids) and use these resources to support cluster-wide combat operations. Supercarriers can provide any number of services, such as resupply of fuel, ammunition, replacement parts, prefabrication of space stations or surface facilities, or even local construction of smaller-scale vessels such as fighters, frigates, and cruisers. _

_Most fleets operate from established bases and supply depots, and generally carry enough consumable supplies to allow them to remain away from bases of operation for months or years at a time. Supercarriers allow GDI and Nod fleets to resupply fleets locally, allowing them to operate with less tonnage devoted to storage and consumable supplies, giving such fleets a tendency to be "leaner." It is worth noting that this tendency to rely on supercarriers is more prevalent among Nod fleets than GDI, who still make use of traditional supply bases as well._

_As a result, supercarriers serve primarily as a strategic resource instead of a tactical one. However, in case of being forced into combat, most supercarriers carry at least one dreadnought-grade ion cannon and a large assortment of fighters and frigates, along with escort fleets. Should combat ensue, a supercarrier will maintain distance from the attacker until it can withdraw, at which point it will relocate to another system._

* * *

_**Codex - Ships And Vehicles - Starships: Glacier-class Dreadnought**_

_When GDI made contact with the Citadel, the size and scale of the dreadnought-class warships used by the asari, salarians, and turians was impressive, particularly the mighty and unparalleled Destiny Ascension. Building off of the design of the standard dreadnought, GDI naval engineers first developed human-engineered dreadnoughts to counter these, but the Initiative's naval command and the Director's Board worried about the superiority of Citadel fleets in terms of sheer firepower. As a result, GDI developed and deployed the Glacier-class dreadnought._

_Fully two and a half kilometers in length, the Glacier is like its namesake: immense, powerful, and not terribly maneuverable or swift. The Glacier mounts four dreadnought-grade ion cannons, and has kinetic barriers strong enough to withstand a like number of dreadnoughts assaulting it. The majority of such immense vessels' space are devoted to the weapons, power generators, and engines necessary to move such a warship in space._

_The Glacier's slow speed, both at STL and FTL speeds, render it unfeasible for typical fleet engagements. Glaciers are instead used to either escort supercarriers, defend high-value worlds, or to assault high-value planets that an enemy fleet must commit to defending. In such cases, the Glacier is used to either force the enemy to flee, or to commit to holding the world. To date, none of the latter instances has resulted in victory for the defenders._

* * *

**_Author's Notes: _**Next chapter: Something awesome happens!

Until next chapter . . . .


	9. Chapter 9: Enemy Of My Enemy

_**Chapter Eight: Enemy Of My Enemy**_

Tali'Zorah vas Neema cracked open the access hatch and poked a fiber-optic cable through it. It opened into a maintenance gantry overlooking the bay where mass transit cars docked to pick up output from the factory; the gantry ran across the bay to another door that, according to the schematics, would lead up to the main warehouse area.

She stared at the screen, tapping her foot in anxious worry. The bay was open to the rest of the warehouse, which meant anyone inside would have a clear shot at her the moment she stepped out onto the gantry, and there wasn't much cover. But it was the least secure approach to the rearmost warehouse area and the offices beyond where Kal was being held. There were likely other hatches further down, but they would either be more secure or didn't show on her schematics.

Nothing ventured, she decided, and quickly opened the hatch the rest of the way. She stepped through.

Without warning, the factory shook violently, and she tumbled through the hatch. Heart shooting up into her throat, Tali activated her cloak and scrambled sideways before she'd even found her footing again. She dropped into a crouch, scanning the warehouse, and could hear warning klaxons overhead. Her suit sensors picked out at least two dozen mobile element zero masses and power sources overhead, rushing toward the far end of the factory, and she could detect local fire alert warnings in the factory's automated emergency-response systems.

In the distance, she heard gunfire and explosions.

Someone else was attacking the factory. She didn't know who or why or how long it would take them to break through, but her experiences thus far told her not to trust anyone on the Citadel. She had to reach Kal'Reegar before they did.

Tali rose and moved as quickly as she could to the door without compromising her camouflage.

* * *

Zaeed Massani rampaged into the chamber beyond the entry dock. That wasn't a verb normally reserved for movement, but the term was applicable when one stomped forward through fire and bullets, blasting away with a multi-barreled mass accelerator and periodically launching rocket-grenades. The floor shuddered under the pounding feet of his Wolverine as he thundered into the room, picking up a couple of armored targets twenty meters away, fleeing for cover behind a piece of heavy manufacturing equipment. He targeted and triggered the guns, the mech shuddering under the force of its own hypervelocity fire. Their shields lasted for a second and a half, while their armor didn't last a third that long.

The room beyond the entry was the typical factory setup, lined with machinery along the walls, cranes overhead to transport refined goods, and flatbed conveyers to move incoming materials to the machinery. Storage would be deeper in, and that was where the quarian would be stashed.

He'd just have to murder and explode his way back there and pull the poor bastard out.

Zaeed stomped into the factory area, sensors tracking half a dozen hostiles, all armed with small arms. They appeared on his display as red wireframe circles around either their visible shapes, thermal overlays, or VI-generated humanoid markers, and all of them were scrambling for cover. He could pick out bursts of signals as they communicated back and forth via radio, no doubt trying to coordinate a counterattack.

Bullets pinged off his armor as the mercenaries sprayed blind fire around corners and over machinery. It wasn't intended to actually stop him or even damage his mech, but rather wear down his shields; continuous small arms fire would steadily drain shields that could resist anti-tank munitions if enough bullets were fired at them.

He snorted. One couldn't wear down shields if the kinetic barriers weren't programmed to activate in response. His Wolverine's shields were modified to ignore small arms unless the incoming round was about to hit something sensitive, like one of the clusters of microcameras or other sensors mounted on the hull. Zaeed came off as a brutish thug at times, which concealed his other attributes; one didn't survive in this business as long as he had without knowledge of weapons tech and the minutiae of the same. He'd reprogrammed the shields on his mech personally, and fine tuned it, his armor, and personal weapons for maximum efficiency. It, coupled with sheer cussed determination, gave him the edge to survive a career fraught with explosions and miscellaneous injuries.

A gleaming red **"Missile lock detected" **flashed across his screen as he crossed the manufacturing area, and Zaeed sneered. About damned time they woke up.

A quartet of rockets screamed toward him from across the room, big ones fired from shoulder launchers. Zaeed sidestepped, the deck pounding under his feet, and the active defense system mounted on his walker spat hypervelocity rounds at the incoming missiles. Two of them exploded before they could reach him, and another was clipped and went careening off to the side to explode against part of the assembly line. The fourth hit his shields, a mass effect field springing up right before impact and detonating the rocket, deflecting the shrapnel and kinetic force away. The mech shuddered but otherwise remained stable, and Zaeed bit out a laugh.

His sensors had backtracked the launchers to their source of origin, a platform across the manufacturing bay. He picked out a collection of mercenaries among the heavy crates and shipping containers and leveled both his mech's guns at them.

"Have to do better than that," he snarled, and returned fire.

* * *

"He's cutting a hell of a swathe," Kaidan noted as

"Your grasp of the obvious is inspiring, Lieutenant," Shepard said as she advanced down the corridor. She checked her omnitool as they paused next to a sealed hatch. "This access takes up to the loading lift in the third warehouse section. The office section is just beyond."

"On it," Kaidan said, stepping past her and firing up his own omnitool. Garrus and Shepard took opposite ends of the corridor.

"Okay," the mutant Marine said after a moment. "Bad news. That friendly fellow in the REV12 up top has triggered a total security lockdown. This hatch is part of it."

"I hope there's good news," Shepard replied, and Kaidan grunted.

"More bad news first. Our friend who came in ahead of us went through here first. That triggered a flag and heightened security on this hatch. Local VI is watching it." He paused.

"The good news . . . is that . . . ." There was a beep, and she heard hydraulic pumping. "That VI isn't quite good enough."

The hydraulics hissed and the hatch began to slide open, the separate door sections sliding up and down slowly. It got wide enough that Kaidan could angle his body through when it suddenly stopped and a harsh buzzing sound rang from hatch's panel.

"Dammit!" Kaidan hissed and grabbed the top of the hatch as it started to close again. He planted a boot on the lower half of the door, and with a snarl, he tightened his muscles and stopped the door cold.

"VI's locking it down! Get inside!" the mutant bit out, and Shepard hurried through the opened doorway. Garrus followed as she swept the room beyond: a maintenance gantry overlooking the bay in the warehouse floor that transports would rise up into to dock and load. As Garrus pushed through the door, she could hear Kaidan snarling, and turned toward him.

The door was closing slowly, despite his inhuman strength, and Shepard realized that Kaidan wouldn't be able to lever himself through the door at the rate it was shutting.

"Alenko, wave off," she ordered. "Find another entrance. You're no good if you get crushed in that door!"

"Aye, ma'am," Kaidan growled, and released the door. It hissed closed as he backed away into the corridor as it descended. "I should be able to get in through another entrance!"

"Understood," she said. "Report when you get through." She turned around, sweeping the bay, and gestured toward a door at the far end that the schematics said would run up to the warehouse.

"There," she said, and Garrus nodded in turn. They started bounding toward it, Shepard in the lead with her heavier armor, and Garrus behind her, covering her rear with his long sniper rifle shouldered. They charged down the gantry, the metal ringing under their boots, and Shepard caught a flicker on her sensors-

Garrus' long rifle pounded behind her, and she distantly heard a choked cry of pain and the wet impact of a round punching through body armor and the flesh underneath. On her sensors she saw at least two other contacts appearing above, at the edge of the bay. The air overhead erupted with gunfire.

Shepard looked up as she ran for the door - less than twenty meters away now - and clenched her left hand. Dark energy swirled around her as she picked out a target. There were two mercenaries, one human and one turian, wearing the same color armor as the men they'd killed in the tunnels. They crouched at the ceramic railing overlooking the bay with weapons shouldered.

Shepard's hand pumped. Gravity pulsed around her and a blast of force rocketed out away from her arm, hurtling up at the human. He ducked behind the solid railing, but the biotic throw curved slightly en route and slammed into the mercenary's upper chest and head as he dropped behind cover. The impact snapped the man's head backwards and sent him tumbling away, unconscious but alive.

The turian mercenary's rifle barked out several quick bursts, hammering her shield and punching through the metal of the gantry. She raised her weapon to fire, and then the merc's head snapped sideways and dark blue blood and chunks of helmet flew up into the air on the opposite side of his helmet. The report of Garrus' rifle echoed around the bay.

"That was impressive," she murmured as she reached the door. It slid open as they approached.

"Took too long to line up," Garrus replied over the comm. "But they know we're here. We need to finish this fast."

The factory shook again, and a long, savage roar of heavy mass accelerator fire sounded from the entrance to the structure. Something else exploded, and more gunfire echoed through the warehouses.

"I think they're going to be a little busy," Shepard said as she ducked through the doorway, and Garrus followed her.

* * *

Whatever it was he was shooting at, the enormous mound of machinery didn't like it, and expressed its displeasure by exploding violently. Zaeed had to take a few steps back lest the walker tumble over. Metal shrapnel deflected off his shields. He glanced at his status display and bit out a curse. The active defense system had taken a hit and was malfunctioning.

The enemy infantry were still firing at him from multiple directions. He ignored the small arms fire, hunting for heavier weapons that posed a real threat to the walker. The hull continued to ring from bullet impacts and the periodic flash of the shields deflecting incoming shots at vitals. He stomped forward, pushing through the smoke and chaos and fire, rounding the burning pile of slag that was once factory machinery.

The onboard VI highlighted a pair of thermal signatures, one on either side of the factory, high up. He looked up on his holo-display, and spotted the two mercenaries on catwalks overlooking the factory about twenty meters up. He saw one with a missile launcher and another setting up some kind of heavy cannon, likely anti-materiel. He targeted the missile launcher, his autocannon rising, but the enemy trooper beat him to the shot.

The missile erupted from the launcher and screamed toward him, smashing into his shields. The mass effect barriers shuddered under the impact and the walker stumbled backward and sideways. Zaeed snarled and bit out a couple of curses as he steadied the walker, and the impacts of small arms fire intensified as the infantry saw his moment of weakness.

His eyes flicked to the walker's internal displays. Shields were out, recharging. It would take a few moment for the launcher to reload. But with his shields down-

"Clever bastards," he bit out while pivoting toward the opposite end of the factory, raising both cannon and missile launcher. He sighted and fired both weapons at the anti-material gunner. The mercenary was still lining up the heavy long-barreled rifle at the mech when Zaeed's cannon fire washed over him in a stream of armor-piercing hypervelocity rounds. His shields held against the first dozen impacts, but the next hundred ripped through his armor and tore him apart. The micro-missiles followed a heartbeat later and blew the remains to vapor and smashed the cannon to pieces.

Zaeed backpedaled, mostly on instinct, and pivoted toward the launcher. His internal status displays were flashing some yellow lights as the weight of enemy fire was making itself known; a dozen men with assault rifles couldn't seriously damage the walker, but the bastards were _persistent_ and with his shields down some shots were hitting the few parts that were exposed and vulnerable.

The mercenary up high had reloaded his weapon, and the launcher fired again. Zaeed kept retreating backwards, pounding over the deck, and dove sideways, triggering his thrusters to give him a boost. The walker slammed into the floor and rolled in a hellish cacophony of grinding and scraping metal, and the missile smashed into the floor a few meters away. The explosion gouged a several-meter-deep furrow in the factory floor.

Zaeed scrambled to his feet, the mech standing up only a little bit more awkwardly than a man in full body armor. He checked his systems as he rose, and saw that for the most part they were undamaged, save the still-unresponsive ADS. The missile, like most non-mass accelerator projectile weapons, had been an anti-armor device intended to penetrate ceramic and metal plating with a directed shaped charge. It wasn't designed for anti-personnel work, which ironically had saved Zaeed from taking further abuse thanks to hypervelocity shrapnel.

As he stood, Zaeed sighted the asshole with the missile launcher, who was frantically reloading his weapon. The old mercenary snorted and leveled his own launcher. The four rocket-grenades that impacted the gantry made sure he'd never get a third shot off.

* * *

Tali crept along the lines of crates along the storage bay, her attention divided between half a dozen tasks. In one corner of her helmet she had data feeds from her suit, giving her information on the power draw on her shields and stealth systems. In another there was a local terrain plot from her suit's sensors, feeding her a plot of the piles of hovercar crates and machinery superimposed over the factory schematics. Three separate windows were open in another corner, tracking the movements of each of the groups of intruders in the factory: the insane mech pilot in the manufacturing bay, the human and turian in the same storage area as Tali, and the lone human in the tunnels below the factory, looking for an entrance. Other data feeds were scattered around her HUD: hacked internal cameras tracking enemy troops, status displays of the active intrusion runtimes she'd inserted into the local systems, and updates from her other hacking programs attempting to gain further access to local systems.

It would have been far too much data for anyone lacking a mind-machine interface to understand - unless they were quarian. Tali's earliest memories were from behind the helmets every quarian wore, and like all of her species, Tali had become accustomed to being surrounded by data displays and constantly-shifting information. She navigated the dizzying array of ever-changing input without even really thinking about it as she crept through the warehouse.

She kept adjusting the parameters on her hacking programs while watching for possible enemy contacts on her displays; she had to be cautious lest she alert the already-wary security VI, which was almost as well-designed as a quarian-coded unit. Popular misconception held that quarians were somehow naturally superior to others when it came to technology, including coding their security systems. The reality was simply that quarian culture was steeped in technology and a quarian was surrounded by complex machinery from birth; a human, turian, or batarian who was born and lived on a constantly-repaired battleship three centuries old would get just as much technical expertise as any quarian. Very few did, however.

She looked over the three sets of intruders - not counting herself, of course - and wondered who they were. Two of the humans wore GDI-issue Intervention armor and the mech was a REV12 Wolverine, but the turian was an anomaly. Were they some other group of mercenaries who had managed to acquire GDI gear? Or were they actual GDI troops? It seemed too chaotic and uncoordinated for a GDI raid, and they would have been expected to use a lot more firepower. Or was it someone else? Shadow Broker? Blue Suns or Eclipse in disguise? Brotherhood of Nod was possible, too. Pheonix Group? She considered the possibility that it was a joint GDI/Citadel operation, but dismissed that as ridiculous. The Citadel would never permit them to operate on the station.

Tali shook her head. She didn't have time to figure out who was attacking. She was close to the office section, which was located on the far wall of this warehouse section. She could see a control room about ten meters up and thirty meters away, and two figures in armor, apparently conversing on the other side of the plate armor-glass. She zoomed in on them and activated a small laser on her omnitool. With a gesture she activated a laser microphone program on her omnitool. Seconds later she could hear the figures inside talking.

"There. I've sent the alert up the relay," said one voice. He was young, male, human, anxious.

"Good," replied the second. Older, certain, definitely batarian. "Seal the outer doors and bring Fourth back to deal with those two in the warehouse. We'll set the heavies in Third, Fifth, and Sixth inside the first warehouse section once he breaches those doors and blow him to hell."

"On it now," the human replied. She could hear the beeping as he hammered away at a haptic interface. "Sealing the doors and recalling the squads. Orders are out. Aines and Houg Balu are mobilized and moving out."

"Have Aines help kill those two in the warehouse," the batarian said. "Houg Balu will help kill the mech."

"Yes sir," the human said. "Orders acknowledged."

"And grab three men," the batarian added, "Keep the quarian under guard. If anyone approaches, kill him. The boss won't like it but we can't risk him escaping and alerting GDI or the Citadel."

"Yes sir," replied the human. Tali's heart shot into her throat again. She had to get to Kal'Reegar before the mercenaries killed him. The others in the warehouse would distract them, but . . . .

She switched over to her hacking runtimes, and checked to see what they had access to. On the internal cameras, she could see that the mech was inflicting all manner of explosive gruesomeness on the troops retreating from the manufacturing section, and the doors connecting that section to the first warehouse were steadily closing in the ponderous manner that countless engineers across the galaxy felt was appropriate. She looked over the access she had inside the warehouse and selected door controls.

Tali paused, considering. The local VI would detect anything overt she did immediately; passive access to cameras and internal sensors and wireless communications was one thing, but outright manipulating the interior of the facility would set the security on her and make things a lot harder.

_Nothing ventured, right? And if you have to reveal yourself, make sure you do so in the most devastating way possible._

Tali accessed the security system and announced her presence to the VI by issuing a blanket override that opened every door in the factory, then locked it completely out of that subsystem. Every door inside the structure, from the restroom stalls to the heavy factory doors, began to trundle open and lock in place. An instant later the security VI began squawking and started tracing her connections inside the factory's network, but it was too late to prevent her from unsealing all accessways inside the facility.

She started forward again, under the cover of the mech pilot's renewed assault as he stomped across the threshold into the warehouse and the mercenaries suddenly found their jobs tenfold more difficult.

* * *

Shepard remained in the lead as she and Garrus moved between two lines of shipping crates, the turian Spectre covering her rear with his long-barreled rifle. The weapon _thoomed _behind her as she reached an intersection in the warehouse and checked her corners. Her sensors showed some contacts close by, but not many.

"Hostile down," the turian murmured, and she grunted in acknowledgement. She checked a superimposed schematic with the real-time map her suit's sensors were assembling. They could have moved faster, climbing on top of the containers with Shepard's jetpack, but that would have exposed both of them to fire from multiple directions. The container-corridors were safer, if slower.

"Moving, my left," she said, and stepped into the intersection, spinning in that direction. Garrus was right behind her, covering the right.

"How far?" he asked as they moved between the crates.

"Right, ten meters," she said. "Open loading area. It'll give us a straight shot toward-"

Three contacts suddenly closed in, dead ahead.

"Two low, one high, fifteen," she barked, dropping to one knee. Garrus spun around behind her, rifle pointing over her head. Fifteen meters down the container corridor, two mercenaries swept through a gap in the crates, rifles shouldered. Garrus and Shepard fired at the same time, the Spectre's shot hitting the leftmost mercenary in the throat and punching clean through his shields. He jerked back, blood fountaining from his ruined neck, and toppled. The second traded a pair of five-round bursts with Shepard, but his shots were wild and thrown off by his movements and the sudden death of his companion. Shepard's rounds were dead on, with eight of the ten bullets impacting the hostile's shields around his head and collapsing them. He ducked back behind cover as Shepard triggered another burst, catching the mercenary in the gut. He was spun around by the impact, blood spraying, and went still.

Both Spectre and Commando immediately shifted their aim up as the third mercenary, a turian, appeared on top of the crates, firing down toward them. Shepard's shields flashed as they deflected the incoming bullets. Her Werewolf battered down the merc's shields and Garrus caught him dead center in the chest before he could drop into cover.

"Down to thirty percent," Shepard reported on her shields.

"I'll take point," Garrus said, and slid past her. She didn't argue, spinning around to cover his rear. The turian started down the container passage, but then halted. Shepard's back bumped into his, and then she saw what had given Garrus pause on her sensors.

Two major power flares had appeared on their sensors, one heading toward the far access door and the other heading straight for them.

"Mech!" she warned, and could hear the hissing of the thrusters the approaching heavy armor suit needed to launch itself across the warehouse toward them. She looked up, spotting the bulky two-meter-tall armature as it landed on a container twenty meters away, the pilot raising both of the walker's arms to fire.

Garrus and Shepard reacted at the same time. His omnitool flashed and a microgrenade hurtled out toward the walker at the same time as Shepard twisted dark energy around her arms. The gravity throw she launched at the mech hit it low in one of its legs. It didn't have enough force to knock the mech down, but it did force the mech back a step. Garrus' ECM grenade hit an instant later, and every weapons system and safety feature on the walker went haywire as the microgrenade triggered overheat alarms.

It bought them a bare few seconds, and Garrus took them, charging down between the looming containers for the gap Shepard had specified, and she chased him. He reached the corner and dove around it, and she leapt after him.

The corridor behind her exploded as hundreds of hypervelocity rounds and three rocket-grenades ripped along the metal floor, gouging furrows and hurling shrapnel. Shepard's shields beeped insistently inside her helmet, warning her that they had been blown out, and pain flickered along her legs from ruptures in her suit.

She scrambled to her feet, her suit pumping medigel into the minor shrapnel wounds. Garrus helped her rise and handed her the Werewolf she'd dropped during her dive. He didn't say anything, instead chopping a hand down the passageway between the containers. She shook her head as the walker fired another couple of bursts at where they had been.

"We have to kill it," she shouted over the din, and he nodded. He slid a canister out of one of his armor pouches and tapped a couple of buttons on the side of his rifle, while Shepard switched her Werewolf over to grenade launcher mode. She glanced back to him as he ejected another canister from his rifle and slid the new one in.

"Tungsten rounds," Garrus murmured, and she nodded as he modded his rifle. Within seconds the weapon would be reconfigured to fire the new ammunition type.

Then the walker's thrusters fired again, and it launched itself over the containers to get a better firing angle. It came crashing down on one of the adjacent metal structures. They raised their weapons and opened fire as it came down.

* * *

Jacob jumped from data feed to data feed, trying to see what was going on inside the factory. Fire and smoke were pouring out of the front entrance, and both C-Sec response units and fire and rescue were likely going to be responding at some point. Spectre authorization would slow down the response, but wouldn't hold them off forever. In the upper right corner of his helmet's HUD was a running status report from his VI as it traced the frequency used by those scout drones he'd detected earlier. If his hunch was right, they belonged to the lunatic in the REV12 walker that was shooting up the building.

"Sir," Lieutenant Durant called over the radio. "Do we go in?"

"Standby," Jacob said, shaking his head. He couldn't see anything inside, and the sensors in his suit couldn't pick up anything with all the usual ECM associated with any raging battle where everyone had omnitools.

"Taylor!" came a sudden call over the radio, and he winced.

"Admiral, this is Taylor, go ahead," he replied.

"What the hell's going on down there?" Admiral Parker yelled. "Is that a Wolverine I see stomping through the front doors? Why didn't Shepard tell me she had a Wolverine on standby?"

"That's not ours, sir," Jacob replied. "Trying to figure out what's going on now."

"Well, C-Sec's going nuts, judging by the radio traffic," the Admiral shouted. "They've got response units arguing with their dispatchers over that Spectre's orders! We don't have time to waste or this thing will go to shit! Get in there!"

"The Commander hasn't called for help yet," Jacob replied, doing his best to keep his voice reasonable and level. That was how you dealt with the mentally unstable and flag-level officers. "Sir, we need to keep those C-Sec response units from coming in and fouling things up. Last thing we need is paramedics and fire units getting caught in the crossfire."

"Lieutenant, I'm not going to have Marines open fire on Citadel personnel, if that's what you're suggesting."

Jacob's heart nearly stopped.

"Uh, sir, that's not what I was suggesting at all," he replied.

"Oh. Well. Sorry. Maybe I should call them up and try to explain," Parker added.

"Maybe leave that to the Ambassador, sir," Jacob suggested. If Admiral Parker started talking to C-Sec and telling them there was a Spectre-authorized GDI raid ongoing, they might start calling in frigates and cruisers. The Citadel knew of Parker's reputation.

"Good idea, Lieutenant," Parker said. "I'll call Udina and sort this out so we keep the police off your backs. In the meantime, get in there and pacify this mess!" The channel closed, and Jacob let out a sigh of relief at the defusing of that particular tactical nuke.

_I am not being paid enough to be a negotiator, _Jacob thought as he switched channels.

"Commander, this is Taylor," he called. "Do you need us in there?"

A moment of silence passed over the radio.

"Commander," Jacob called again, "Do you-"

"Killer mech, can't talk!" Shepard suddenly shouted over the radio, followed by a crashing explosion. The line went dead.

"Uh," Jacob said, and made a split-second command decision. He switched channels while reaching for his Werewolf. "Durant, this is Talyor. Admiral's given us orders, we're going in! All squads move in!"

He fired up the hovercars thrusters and swung it around, lifting out of the airborne parking space he'd taken and diving toward the entrance to the factory. As the vehicle descended, the VI flashed a message to him that it had managed to get through the countermeasures around the drones' frequencies. He brought up the communications frequency and keyed it into his radio. The VI hadn't broken the encryption between the drones and the mech driver, but he didn't need to know what they were saying to one another.

"This is First Lieutenant Taylor, GDI," Jacob announced over the radio as the car dropped toward the factory receiving docks. A half-dozen other cars descended around him, carrying the rest of the platoon. "Acknowledge."

* * *

The mercenaries' resistance lightened up dramatically as Zaeed blasted through the first warehouse section. He'd been worried for a moment when the doors had started closing, and had been preparing to set his armor's VI to hack the doors when they'd unexpectedly begun to reopen. He'd initially suspected an ambush, but the way the mercenaries had started flat-out fleeing and hiding told him that the opening blast doors were just as much a surprise to them.

That meant someone else was in here. And if someone was opening the doors for him, it meant they had a vested interest in making sure he did his job. And that told Zaeed that someone was using him to their own ends.

Zaeed didn't like being used.

He was most of the way through the first warehouse with only a few of the enemy thugs shooting back at him when his VI flashed that he was receiving an incoming radio message. He flicked it on, and what he heard next didn't terribly surprise him.

"This is First Lieutenant Taylor, GDI," said a young man's voice. "Acknowledge." Zaeed grunted and flicked on his transceiver with one hand while blowing up a mercenary with the other. He was an old hand at multitasking.

"GDI?" he asked. "I thought this was a Citadel op, to be honest."

"Identify yourself," Taylor demanded. Reasonable request from the lad.

"I'm the bloody Grim Reaper," Zaeed replied.

"Well, Mister Grim Reaper, you're in the middle of a joint GDI-Citadel operation," Taylor continued without missing a beat. Zaeed liked him already.

"You asking me to leave?" Zaeed asked. A trio of micro-rocket grenades caught two more optimistic mercs as they emerged from cover to fire. _Messy_.

"I would hate to be forced to open fire on you," Taylor replied. "Check your fire and we won't need to shoot at you."

"That's how its going to work then?" Zaeed asked with a grin. He activated his thrusters and leapt forward fifteen meters, clearing some containers. He could see the second door up ahead, and on his trackers he could pick up maybe half a dozen mercenaries still in this section of the factory. Almost none of them were firing now, and he let them be.

"Lieutenant, you know the first rule of infantry interactions with vehicle-mounted weaponry, right?" Zaeed asked. A moment of silence followed. "Infantry are infantry. Without proper IFF you're all targets."

"I'm not giving you GDI IFF codes," Taylor responded, and Zaeed nodded.

"Well, that's just sensible." He gunned down another optimistic mercenary and stomped through the second set of double doors. "But don't fret, Lieutenant. I was a Marine too."

He tapped a couple of keys on his haptic display as he moved through the doors, sweeping the warehouse beyond for hostiles. He spotted several enemy mercenaries getting into elevated positions. The second warehouse area was wide open, with tall stacks of containers on either side of the chamber; perfect for setting up a crossfire. There were a few containers and some loading equipment scattered around the area, abandoned in the wake of the sudden attack, maybe. The stacks of shipping containers made for an excellent killing ground.

"You're still using Mark VI Intervention, right? Hanhe-Kedar standard-issue, modular template?" he asked.

"Why?" Taylor asked in turn.

"Because if you are, that makes programming my armor to recognize you a lot easier," Zaeed said. he checked the container stacks again, but the mercenaries up there seemed content to leave him alone as they regrouped. They were planning another ambush.

Or were they? His eyes narrowed as he thought carefully about this warehouse and what the enemy would be doing. They were almost assured to try to hit him in a crossfire here. Cover favored them far too well. But they had to know that he knew that, and they were still reeling from his assault through the first warehouse.

"Yeah, Mark VI suits," Taylor confirmed, after a few seconds of consideration. "No Zone armor, just Marine units."

Zaeed tapped a couple more keys and then linked his camera feeds to the outgoing transmission.

"Got you," he said, and spotted more than thirty highlighted contacts, most at the entrance to the factory and moving in. "And a bit of cheer and goodwill for you, too, so you know what I'm shooting at, eh?"

As he spoke, he advanced into the warehouse, weapons high.

"This means you'll cooperate?" Taylor asked.

"It means that we've got the same enemy," Zaeed said as he stomped forward into the oddly un-hostile warehouse. "Not that we're friends. You know the old maxim, right? The enemy of my enemy?"

"Yeah, is my enemy's enemy, nothing more," Taylor finished.

"Just don't touch the quarian," Zaeed added. He was ten meters into the warehouse, and no one had shot at him yet. That meant the ambush was pending and growing closer every second. "The quarian is-"

The enemy mech powered up and rushed the opposite door. It must have been in standby, because his sensors suddenly flared with the thermal signature and the active element zero core without any warning, and a heartbeat later it had leapt up on thrusters to vault over some intervening cargo modules on the other side of the far door. The walker hit the deck with a deafening crash of metal and ceramics and charged straight toward him, mass accelerators on the left arm and automatic grenade launcher firing. It was a tall, slender thing, not as squat and wide and squarish as the Wolverine. It had a sharp, angular design with longer legs and thinner arms; a turian Steelclaw walker.

At the same time, two cargo containers on either side of the room flew open and more than forty spindly, humanoid drones clambered out, armed with pistols and submachineguns. The head-shaped sensor units on their heads gleamed a bright red as they strode forward with mindless, machine determination.

Then the mercenaries on the cargo containers on either side of the warehouse leapt up and opened fire.

"And there's the rub," Zaeed said with a snarl. His accelerators and grenade launchers opened up, and he fired his thrusters to move sideways and forward, as a hundred hypervelocity rounds slammed into his shields and armor.

* * *

Tali found two ways to reach the offices from the warehouse. The first was an exposed stairway that ran up from the warehouse floor, while the second was an open elevator. The former would be covered by proximity sensors, and the latter would reveal anyone trying to use it. Neither option favored Tali's approach, so she did what quarians were experts at: improvisation with technology. She climbed the wall.

Her gloves and boots had mass effect field generators in them, which were nearly standard equipment for quarian engineers, who had to work in zero gravity. Under the cover of her optical cloak, she ran up to the wall and activated them, scrambling up the wall toward the offices overhead using the gravity field the gauntlets and boots generated. She couldn't use them for long; the power draw was enormous and would show up on any sensor pointed in her general direction, but they served to get her up onto the stairs' landing. She vaulted over the railing and dropped into a low crouch, drawing her pistol.

On her sensor displays, Tali spotted one contact inside the offices. It was the batarian officer she'd noted earlier, who was tapping away furiously at a terminal before him and snapping orders and an enormous heavy rifle leaning on the console beside him. The display before him flickered between a tactical map and various camera feeds from around the factory.

She paused to check her own, and grimaced behind her facemask. According to the data feeds, the madman in the Wolverine was currently engaged with another walker and about forty drone mechs, as well as overhead fire from multiple mercenaries. In the third warehouse section, another mercenary mech was leaping from cargo container to cargo container, firing down at someone below, likely the other two figures she'd spotted earlier. At the outer docking bay about thirty more humanoids wearing GDI-issue hardsuits and armed with Werewolf weapons were landing and advancing into the factory.

This were getting more complicated by the minute. She couldn't afford to wait around. She had to find Kal'Reegar and get the hell out.

Tali slipped through the office, unnoticed by the batarian officer as he worked, and headed for a wide doorway at the back that led to the rest of the office section. As she moved to the rear of the office, however, she caught sight of an open maintenance hatch on the far wall. Doublechecking the schematics she'd downloaded, it appeared that the hatch was a new addition. Her suit's sensors scanned the hatch and the tunnel beyond, and she realized that it ran down to the maintenance area below the factory.

_Of course, _she thought with annoyance. _There had to be an _easy _route that would have let me bypass all this trouble that I overlooked._

But still, it was a lucky break for her, and she marked the hatch on her map. Once she got to Kal'Reegar and got him moving, it would give them a quick way out.

She slipped down the hallway beyond, pistol at the ready. Her sensors picked out several more figures, and they resolved into four more hostiles. On her schematic overlay, they appeared down the hall and to the right. She advanced down the passage, and as she drew closer to the corner, Tali's sensors picked out a faint fifth contact. The power source was weak but noticeable, and it was consistent with a quarian hardsuit.

Her heart began pounding faster, and Tali tapped her omnitool. On her helmet display she could see the keys on the omnitool's haptic interface without it having to light up, and with a couple of presses she had it assembling a tiny camera drone. A moment later her helmet confirmed the creation of the tiny device, and she shot it against the wall around the corner using the omnitool's launcher. It stuck to the wall, and its feed appeared on her HUD. She rotated the lens toward the enemy troops.

Four mercenaries, two turian, one batarian, one human. They were standing outside a single door to what looked like a storage closet, one turian facing down the hallway in her direction while the other three seemed to be talking quietly. The one looking down the hallway didn't seem to have noticed the tiny camera drone she'd used.

She came around the corner, and this time the turian on guard seemed to notice something. He started to raise his weapon at what he most likely saw as an odd disturbance in the air.

Tali's microgrenade struck him dead center and detonated, filling the air with ECM. Visors scrambled, shield emitters sparked, and weapons vented hissing gases while fooled into overheat mode. All four mercenaries stumbled in surprise. The turians recovered first, the one on guard dropping his malfunctioning rifle and unfolding a shotgun, and the other drawing a pistol.

Tali sighted the nearest turian and squeezed her pistol's trigger. There was a whining howl, and the turian's helmet exploded as a bright red laser beam sliced through his head. The second turian was spinning toward her, raising his sidearm, and she put two more laser beams through his chest. The human and the batarian didn't even get the chance to really respond; before they could recover and grab at their sidearms, Tali sent four more beams down the hallway, drilling both mercenaries twice in the chest. They dropped, armor clattering to the floor, and Tali dashed down the hallway. No other contacts appeared on her sensors.

She stepped into the closet and paused.

Kal'Reegar was slumped in a chair, hands cuffed behind his back. A spindly automated medical drone hovered next to him, a pair of IV lines running from the drone into his left arm's medical interface slots.

"Kal," Tali breathed and ran to his side. She decloaked as she did so, and his head perked up.

"Tali'Zorah?" he mumbled, his words slurred. Tali opened the kit she had at her side and drew a trio of autosyringes. She pulled the IVs out of his suit and slipped the first one into his suits interface.

"Are you hurt?" she asked, and he grunted.

"Bastards had me swimming in some nasty crap," he said. The stimulants started working their way into his system, and she injected the painkillers and medigel. "No food or water. Damn drone jolted me everytime I fell asleep." He shook his head as the drugs took effect. She steadied him with one hand and gave him the third injection, this one of antibiotics. Only the most meticulously sterilized needles were safe for a quarian, and she didn't trust these mercenaries' medical skills.

"Don't move yet," she said. "Give it a minute to get into your blood." She crouched beside him and checked the cuffs. They were simple plastic zip-ties; she pulled the knife she kept on her boot and cut them free.

"Can't sit around," Kal muttered, shaking his head again. He brought his hands up, flexing his fingers. She activated her omnitool and connected to his suit. Unsurprisingly, most of his systems were locked down, and she quickly unlocked and rebooted them. "How'd you get in?"

"I snuck in," she said, glancing to the door, and frowned. They didn't have much time, despite her advice to Kal. "Nevermind, can you stand?"

He started to rise, movements wobbly, and Tali got a shoulder under his arm and helped him stand. They started out of the closet.

"Just need a gun," Kal said, and she nodded. Tali opened her mouth to speak, but then froze.

Multiple contacts were closing in in the corridors outside. She looked up just in time to see the batarian officer she'd passed come charging around the corner, that enormous heavy machinegun in his hands. He shouldered it, and the weapon began thundering.

* * *

Tech Sergeant Richard Aines piloted his Steelclaw over the cargo containers, sweeping for the two infantry below. His shields had been depleted to seventy percent by the initial exchange a few moments ago, but were strong enough to survive a few more exchanges. Unlike his targets' hardsuit shields, though, the Steelclaw mech's shields would require a few seconds longer to initiate recharging because of all the other power draws pulling at the walker's generator.

The Steelclaw was a turian design, and while Aines had been a Wolverine pilot in GDI for six years, it still took some work to get used to turian notions regarding "personal ultra-heavy powered armor units." Unlike the Wolverine models, the Steelclaw was designed for medium-range combat, with hardpoints to mount surface to air and anti-armor missile racks. Its shields were modified to have stronger emitters oriented toward the frontal arc, and its armor was lighter for improved maneuverability.

It was a solid design, and a good effort by the Hierarchy at implementing walker designs. The turians hadn't had an equivalent during the First Contact War and had suffered for it in urban combat. But Aines would have preferred the solid weight of his old REV7 Wolverine. The missile mounts were useless indoors (and thus hadn't been loaded), and the frontally-oriented shields made flanking attacks dangerous. But against light infantry like the human and turian beneath him inside the maze of cargo containers, he was confident that his rocket-grenades and mass accelerators would be more than enough.

Aines picked them up on his sensors just below, on the opposite side of a cargo container directly ahead. He hopped forward, not bothering with the walker's thrusters, and felt the satisfying crash of metal on ceramic as his walker landed. He stomped forward toward the edge of the container, raising the heavy mass accelerator on his right arm.

His displays flickered and washed with static as he reached the edge, and Aines snarled a curse, ordering a VI purge of the interference. The Steelclaw's VI moved to clear out the ECM greande's interference, and then his walker shook and a dull detonation sounded outside, the noise mitigated by his armor. He took a step back out of the enemy's line of sight, and sidestepped. Another grenade shot past him, barely missing his walker.

One of them - the turian, he suspected - had an EW-grade omnitool, and knew how to use the damned thing. The human had a Werewolf configured with a grenade launcher, and that was making things sticky, but not unmanageable. As his displays cleared, Aines stomped forward again, certain he could spot and target the pair before they could fabricate another ECM grenade.

The static vanished just in time for him to see the human, clad in GDI Intervention armor, shoot up in front of him, less than a meter away, riding a jetpack's thrust. Aines blinked in shock as the human's left hand snapped forward, tossing something small, flat, and disc-shaped at the front of his armor, before cutting thrust from the jetpack and dropping back down.

The charge detonated and blew Aines backward off the container, sending him and his Steelclaw tumbling backward to the floor with a crash of tortured metal and composites. His vision went black for an instant before he recovered, and he found himself staring up at a flickering holographic display, warning icons flashing that more than half his suit's systems must have been compromised. Every centimeter of his body was protesting, and a marching band with steel-shod boots was circling around on his brain.

_Mag-grenade, probably high-ex mod, _he thought through the haze of pain, and he started moving his arms, pushing the Steelclaw back onto its feet.

Then the armored human appeared atop the container, followed by the turian.

The human's arm left pumped, dark blue blurs curling around armored fingertips, and then a cloud of twisting blue light surged around Aines' armor. Vibrations ran through it, shivering the pilot, and he could hear metal and composite plating twisting around him. The warping field ripped and churned at his armor, cracking and breaking the composite layers that made it impregnable to small arms. Already damaged by the mag-grenade, the armor buckled and twisted like damp clay.

Aines raised his mech's arms, leveling his weapon at the pair.

The human's grenade launcher barked as the biotic warping field tore apart his armor, and his shields - now at twenty-two-percent - detonated the grenade. The explosion shook his armor and blew out the remainder of the Steelclaw's shields.

Aines targeted the pair and started to trigger his weapons when the turian's rifle thundered, and a tungsten hypervelocity round punched through the rent armor of his mech's front plate. It slammed through the inner armor and into the cockpit, before ripping into Aines' upper left lung and blowing out the other end of the Steelclaw.

There wasn't any pain, just a savagely hard impact in his torso, and a sudden sensation of empty numbness. Exhaustion swept over the startled tech sergeant, and his mech's arms locked in place as Aines relaxed and went still.

* * *

Jacob pushed through the still-raging flames around the entrance to the factory section, his Werewolf switched to shotgun mode. The Intervention armor could handle the heat. He emerged into the corpse-and-fire-strewn room, littered with ruined and burnt manufacturing equipment. The other thirty Marines in Durant's platoon were pushing into the factory around him, hopping over obstacles with their jetpacks.

"Commander, this is Taylor," he called as he triggered his jetpack and launched himself over a smashed conveyor belt. "We're inside the factory. No contacts."

"Taylor, repeat that," Shepard said, her voice strained. "Did you say you were inside the factory?"

"Yes ma'am," he replied. He heard a sudden shout to his right, and his sensors showed a possible contact. He pivoted toward the contact point, to see a Marine with his Werewolf leveled at a mercenary. The merc had dropped his weapon and had his hands in the air.

Not surprise there. If he'd just had half his fellows gunned down by a walker and found a small army of GDI Marines storming into his base, he'd probably throw in the towel too. The surrendering merc was forced to the floor by the Marine and disarmed, while the rest of the squad pushed on.

"Taylor, I didn't send a signal for you to move in," Shepard called over the radio, annoyance marking her words.

"Understood, ma'am," Jacob replied. "But Admiral Parker gave the order to assault."

"I see," Shepard said after a moment.

"We're securing prisoners now, no resistance so far," he added. "We've also made contact with that Wolverine pilot."

"What did he say?" Shepard asked.

"He's human, and he's not here for us," Jacob said. They were nearing the doorway for the first warehouse and could hear a savage exchange of gunfire ahead. "He agreed to hold fire on us until the mercs are dealt with. Enemy of my enemy, I guess."

"Yeah, except the enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy. Know the maxim, lieutenant."

"He said the same thing, ma'am," Jacob acknowledged as he and a squad swept into the next warehouse section, searching for survivors or hostiles. They'd picked up another pair of prisoners, both wounded, going by the reports from the fireteam leaders.

"We're entering the offices now," Shepard added. "We should have the quarian in a couple of minutes, but be on alert for anything. I think our interests are going to conflict soon."

"Understood, ma'am."

* * *

The open section between the stacks of crates and cargo containers and the control room would have been easy to defend, if any of the mercenaries had been around to defend it. The gantries overhead and the elevated control room provided perfect lines of fire, but no one was shooting at them; the Wolverine pilot must have drawn off most of their manpower, before blowing it to pieces.

"You hear gunfire ahead?" Shepard asked, and Garrus nodded.

"Up there, past the control room," Garrus said.

Without speaking they bolted across the open floor toward the stairway running up to the control room. She kept an eye on her sensors, but there were no contacts visible; every hostile in the factory was apparently either busy shooting at someone else or busy being dead. Shepard's radio chirped as they ran.

"Commander, Alenko," Kaidan's voice called. "I think I found an access into the offices."

"Hurry up," Shepard replied. "I think someone's shooting up our package, and someone else wants to steal it."

"Yes ma'am. I'm on the way."

They ran up the stairway, Shepard leading and Garrus covering her back. She suspected there were proximity sensors in the stairs to warn anyone of intruders, but right now she didn't give a damn as she pounded up the steps, Werewolf raised and body pulsing with dark energy.

* * *

The enemy Steelclaw advanced, firing as it came. The spindly combat mechs did so as well, but their pistol rounds deflected off his REV12's armor plating. Zaeed kept his Wolverine moving, firing off a volley off rocket grenades at the enemy Steelclaw. It sidestepped to its left, thrusters firing, and only one of the missiles hit, skipping off its shields. Its return fire bit into his own deflectors, hypervelocity rounds hammering his barriers and sending a constant corona of swirling blue surging around him.

The mercenaries above kept firing down at him, half a dozen assholes with assault rifles pouring bullets down at Zaeed as he danced around the Steelclaw. They were largely ineffective, but the constant hammering on his armor and the warning lights from his external systems were troubling. He had to kill the Steelclaw fast, before one of them-

Instinct and a flicker of movement on his sensors sent Zaeed leaping aside, thrusters firing, and another anti-armor missile slammed into the deck where he was standing. He snarled as he felt the shockwaves of the detonation through his armor, and frantically moved to reacquire the Steelclaw. He spotted it just as it loosed another volley of rocket microgrenades, and he jerked in the opposite direction. Two missed, careening past him, with the third plowed into his shields. The vibrations from the detonation shivered across his mech, and he returned fire on the turian walker. His rounds scattered off its forward shields, and it came on, spraying bursts at his Wolverine to avoid overheating.

There was a sudden impact against his shields, and the mech's warning siren howled that he was down to less than twenty percent shields. Must have been another joker with an anti-materiel rifle. One of his sensor feeds cut out as enemy fire blew it apart. A warning light flashed on his grenade launcher indicating the loading mechanism was jamming. Another burst of enemy grenades sent him scrambling out of the way.

He was taking fire from all sides, outgunned and hilariously outnumbered. The only possible allies he might have would be the GDI Marines entering the factory, but they were too far away.

"The hell with it," Zaeed muttered as his shields kept dropping, and he disengaged. He backpedaled, sweeping his cannons up and firing suppressive bursts at the mercenaries on top of the container stacks. They dove for cover as his shots gouged lines of holes in the metal around them. He fired his thrusters as he retreated, giving him extra speed while running for the warehouse door. The Steelclaw pursued, the pilot sensing his opponent's weakness, and Zaeed managed a tight grin.

"Come get me, bastard," he murmured as he backed through the door into the first warehouse, and broke to the right. He got the massive doorframe between himself and his opponents, breaking their lines of fire, and stomped toward the cargo containers scattered around the corpse-strewn warehouse. He got one between himself and the pursuing enemy mech, and on his displays he saw the targeting marker around the Steelclaw suddenly shoot up into the air. Zaeed checked his thrusters, saw them mostly recharged, and nodded.

It leapt up, over the cargo container Zaeed was using for cover, intent on getting to an elevated position and finishing off its wounded prey.

Zaeed fired his thrusters and leapt straight into the Steelclaw's path as it descended.

The turian mech was dropping into the lower slope of its arc, having expended the immediately available thruster power available to it while running Zaeed down. It would take critical seconds to recharge the thrusters, and during that time it was a helpless captive of the laws of physics. The Steelclaw's pilot could only watch with sudden terror as the Wolverine shot up and Zaeed punched out with his grenade launcher arm, smashing into the lower legs and turning its graceful descent into a tumbling fall. A horrible crash of metal and ceramic screeched through the warehouse as they connected and went tumbling apart.

Zaeed's mech didn't escape unscathed, as the collision spun him around, but he still had a couple seconds' worth of thruster power, and he managed to turn his tumble into a rough, slowed fall. He hit the ceramic floor with his mech's legs bending to absorb the impact, and whirled on the Steelclaw.

The enemy mech was lying in a heap, facedown after an uncontrolled tumble into a forklift and a pair of smaller containers. It was starting to rise, but the pilot was clearly shaken by the unexpected impact.

He was shaken even more when Zaeed's two-ton walker crashed down onto its back. The heavier Wolverine pressed the Steelclaw into the deck, and he jammed his mass accelerator into the walker's torso.

It took four seconds, during which time about eighty armor-piercing rounds were fired at point-blank into the back of the mech. The metal deformed, twisted, and finally broke under the impact, and Zaeed sent a two-second burst into the exposed cockpit.

He hopped off the mech's back and turned, ignoring the blood pooling around the Steelclaw's corpse, and started back into the warehouse.

The subsequent slew of carnage took twenty-two seconds. All forty drones and five of the seven mercenaries within fell to his guns, and Zaeed pressed on.

* * *

Tali spun and shoved Kal'Reegar back into the doorway as the batarian's heavy machinegun sprayed incendiary rounds toward them. They hammered her shields as she dove back behind cover. Tali rolled onto her feet, drawing her pistol again, and saw Kal laying on the floor but pushing himself to his feet. Dozens of incendiary bullets pummeled the doorframe, throwing flecks of burning phosphates through the air like golden snowflakes.

"Enthusiastic sumbitch," Kal grunted as he got to his feet.

"I count three shooters," Tali added as she checked her displays, and he nodded.

"Scanners booting back up," he grunted. "Looks the same."

Tali wanted to glance out the doorway, but the machinegun fire was constant and intense. Every second a half-dozen bullets would hit the doorframe, deflecting off the thick metal.

"Suppressing fire," Kal said. "They'll move troops up under that and throw grenades in here until they see out suits stop working. Maybe take two or three to kill us. Probably take apart out gear to figure out where we're hiding the data, and then-"

"Kal, you're babbling," Tali cut him off, and he stopped. His helmet canted toward the dropped rifles of the four dead men outside.

"Stims, sorry," he said. "Should have grabbed one of their guns."

Tali looked at the door and her sensors. The trio of mercenaries were holding position right now, firing bursts at the doors. The corridor was not ideal for a fire-by-maneuver assault, as the suppressing fire from the batarian could easily hit one of the advancing troops. That might give the two quarians some time while they worked up their courage. Maybe she could hack into the lighting systems or fire suppression equipment to cover them? Without direct line of fire she couldn't use ECM on their weapons or shields. She knew that they _had _to get past that batarian shooter, as the control room outside was the only way out.

"Tali, I can buy you a few seconds once my suit's shields reboot," Kal said suddenly. "I can step out in front and use my barriers to stop them, then you hit them with a grenade."

"Kal, that's suicide!" she said, and he nodded.

"You got a better plan?" he asked. "We're pinned down and you can't take out their weapons with ECM unless someone draws their fire. And you're more valuable."

"I came here to save you," she said, "Not so you could throw yourself away!"

"Look, we ain't got time to argue," Kal replied, shaking his head. "Unless you've got a better plan?"

Tali froze, uncertain. She might be able to find another way out, but they might not have time. On her sensor display she could see the other two mercenaries starting to move up around the corner. There had to be another way to do this, a way that wouldn't get Kal killed.

Then the gunfire suddenly came to an abrupt halt, and she heard a shout of surprise outside. A heartbeat later there was a crack of a grenade going off, and her sensors picked up two more contacts close by.

Neither Tali nor Kal hesitated. She bolted up and swept around the doorframe, pistol up, and spotted the two turian mercenaries who had been moving up to flank them, frozen in the middle of the corridor and looking back. Beside her, Kal was scooping up an assault rifle and bringing it to bear. Tali got the first shot off, putting two beams into the nearest mercenary's back and sending him crumpling to the floor, while Kal sighted the second and put two bursts into his shield before he could turn. He managed to spun and raise his weapon before the shields collapsed, but by that point Kal put four shots into his faceplate and Tali shot him through the torso.

Down the hallway, they saw the crumpled body of the batarian officer, and sweeping around the corner were two more figures: the GDI-armored human and turian she'd seen earlier. They raised their weapons toward the quarians, and Tali nearly pulled the trigger, until the human halted and raised a fist.

* * *

"This is unexpected," Shepard murmured to Garrus.

"Someone broke in ahead of us and locked those doors open," he pointed out. "I'm not surprised to see a second quarian here."

To be honest, she thought the first quarian had just escaped and had been responsible for the chaos, but Garrus' suspicions were a lot more plausible. The female quarian in the dark purple and black armor stood protectively over the second one, a male wearing a red and white hardsuit. It was obvious which one had been the prisoner; the male was moving sluggishly, despite being larger and wielding an assault rifle, and the female was protecting him. More interestingly, the female's pistol was familiar; Shepard had seen the design used by Nod boarders during the Blitz.

Where did a quarian get Brotherhood weaponry? Man-portable laser weaponry was almost as tightly-regulated as tiberium and ion-based weapons systems. Or at least it _apparently _was.

Shepard lowered her weapon slowly, holding up her left hand in a placating gesture. She saw Garrus follow suit, his weapon dropping.

"I'm Commander Shepard, GDI Navy," she said.

"Garrus Vakarian," he added. "Citadel Special Tactics and Recon. We're here to get you out of here."

"How can I trust you?" the female quarian said, and Shepard scowled behind her helmet. For just an instant, she imagined sending a biotic pulse down that hallway and knocking the quarian off her feet so they could disarm her and talk without leveling guns at each other. The temptation was intense, but she held back. Instead, she lowered her Werewolf all the way, and opened the front of her helmet, showing her face.

"Listen, I know you're afraid," she said, keeping her words gentle. "I now what happened to your friends. But we're here to get you out. I promise."

The quarian hesitated, weapon quivering slightly, and Shepard knew she was thinking intently. Then the second quarian said something too quiet for Shepard to hear, and she went still. The pistol in her hand dropped.

"Okay," she breathed. Shepard could hear the relief in the quarian's voice. "Okay. Just get us out of here. Please."

"I've got an extraction force on the way, but we need to move," Shepard said. "What's your name?"

"Tali'Zorah," the female said, walking toward them. The male followed her, trying to hide his sluggish movements. "This is Kal'Reegar."

"Are you injured?" Shepard asked.

"Drugs," Kal'Reegar replied, his voice surprisingly strong. "Had me on some stuff to loosen my head and make me weak. Tali gave me stims. I'm good to fi-"

An explosion shook the floor they stood on, and Garrus and Shepard spun toward the corridor leading out of the office section. The control room's front windows and consoles had been blasted inward, shrapnel and debris crashing down and flying about the room. A couple of seconds later the REV12 Wolverine appeared in the gaping hole, flying through on its thrusters.

The REV12 was just over two meters tall, a chopped-down version of the primary model, designed for close-quarters work that let it fit down corridors. That fact did not make the metallic beast any less formidable as it stomped up to the hall, completely filling the doorway. Shepard could see fresh battlescars marking where countless hypervelocity rounds had scored hits upon it.

"Alright," called a sudden, gravelly voice, tinged with an English accent. "I know there's only a few of you in there. Bring out the quarian and no one gets splattered."

Shepard looked to the pair of quarians. Tali'Zorah was clutching her pistol anxiously, while Kal'Reegar had his assault rifle in hand. Despite his lethargic movements, he seemed alert and ready. Tali'Zorah was still partially shielding him with her own body; Shepard couldn't read quarian body language very well, so she didn't know if Kal'Reegar's slumped posture was due to weariness or annoyance at her protectiveness.

"Friend of yours?" Shepard asked, and Tali'Zorah shook her head. Shepard looked back.

"This is Commander Shepard, GDI Navy," she called. "We are conducting an operation critical to the security of both the Citadel and GDI. Stand down!"

"Sure, I'll stand down right now and let you walk away," the Wolverine's pilot replied. "Just as soon as I get the quarian's data. And for that I need the quarian."

Shepard glanced back to Tali'Zorah again, then to Kal'Reegar.

"I don't have it with me," she said, shaking her head. "Its secured."

"I opt-flashed my copy when they ambushed us," Kal'Reegar added. "Nothing but quantum junk data now."

"Which means he needs one of you," Shepard said.

"I'll need both, actually," the Wolverine driver added. "Yeah, I can hear you loud and clear, and I can see both quarians on my scopes."

"Why both?" Shepard demanded.

"Contract," he replied. "My employer wants exclusive access to the quarians' data."

"Meaning," Garrus hissed, "Once he has the data the quarians will disappear."

"Not happening!" Shepard called back.

"You really don't want to make me come in there, do you?" the pilot asked. "I've got plenty of grenades, and I can get what I need from corpses if need be."

"There's an entire platoon of Marines coming up behind you," Shepard shot back. "You won't escape if you open fire on us."

"Tell that to the fifty mercs, forty mechs, and the walker I killed to get here," the pilot replied. There was no boast in his voice, just calm, cold fact. "Your Marines are better-armed, but they're just foot infantry with nice guns. I'll go through 'em like butter. Hand those two over and this ends without anyone else getting hurt."

"Not happening," Shepard said. "I'm not going to let you make them disappear."

In the corner of her vision, Shepard saw Tali'Zorah's head jerk toward her in surprise.

"Well, that's not the way I'd prefer it," the pilot replied, and she heard a bit of weariness in his tone. His mass accelerator spun up, and he took a step forward.

Shepard shouldered her weapon and rose, switching to her grenade launcher and drawing dark energy around her. The others around her leveled their weapons too. She signaled Jacob with a quick flash on her HUD as his Marines surged forward through the last warehouse section, but she knew they wouldn't get there in time. In close-quarters combat with a REV12, it would be over quick.

One way or the other.

Then the Wolverine was surrounded by a corona of shimmering blue light, and started to lift up off the floor. Shepard blinked in surprise, and the Wolverine's pilot let out a shout and a curse. Then a figure shot across the doorway - a bulky human in GDI armor. He reached up and grabbed the suspended Wolverine by the leg, set his feet, and spun in place.

The Wolverine was effectively weightless thanks to the mass effect field lifting it into the air, but it still had inertia, and it took a lot of force to move two tons of inertia. The Marine swung the walker around like an enormous sack of ceramic blocks, and hurled it out through the gap it had blasted in the front of the control room. The Wolverine hurtled through the ragged gap, spinning end over end, until the mass effect field collapsed and it tumbled fifteen meters to the deck outside.

The Marine turned toward the quartet down the passage, and Shepard realized who it was.

"Commander, we've got to move!" Kaidan shouted, and she waved the two quarians forward.

"Alenko! It took you long enough!" Despite her words, she was grinning behind her helmet.

"Sorry, ma'am," he said as they entered the blasted control room. He pointed to the maintenance hatch they'd passed earlier. "That runs down to the maintenance tunnels. Took me forever to find it."

"Under the circumstances, Lieutenant, I'm not going to complain." Shepard keyed her comms. "Taylor, fallback, we have the package. We'll need extraction at our original drop off point."

"Acknowledged," Jacob called back. "We're disengaging."

"What about him?" Tali'Zorah asked, pointing out the hole in the front of the room. The REV12 Wolverine lay prone, and was slowly starting to stand back up.

"Leave him," Shepard said, shaking her head. "We're getting out of here."

* * *

Presence - _query_ - enhance - _observation_

Request - Threat Potential - transmission - upload

Delay - observation.

Response - Communication - Verification (:saren) = Self-identification transmission - translation matrix initiated

_Potential threat - observation mission detection possible:Maintainposition:Query - Unlikely maintenance covert presence?::Acknowledgement_

_:Query - threat covert observation high? - confirmation requested:_

_Upload received - sort (councilchambers/gdiembassy/turianembassy/csecheadquarters) - data distribution_

_Query - multiple targets insufficient forces?:Irrelevant._

_Query - deployment unlikely survivors/recovery?:_

_Query - unlikely survival?:Irrelevant._

Delay

_Acknowledgement_

_Weapons - Standby engage_

_Arm - plasma projector - confirmed - status nominal_

_Arm - kinetic liquid-ichor impactors - confirmed - status nominal_

_Arm - phase shift generator - confirmed - status nominal_

_Arm - interceptors - confirmed - status nominal_

_Arm - ion storm generator - confirmed - status nominal_

_Weapons - confirmation all weapons armed _

_Standby to engage:target:citadel_

* * *

_**Codex - Ships And Vehicles - Wolverine**_

_The Wolverine is a multi-purpose, high-mobility infantry fighting vehicle, colloquially referred to as a "mech" by humans, standing at between two to three meters (depending on configuration). It is bipedal vehicle piloted by a single operator that is designed to bridge the gap between an infantryman's mobility and an IFV's firepower, with historically variable results. Nearly two centuries of continuous research, testing, and combat have refined the Wolverine design into a formidable weapons system ideal for urban combat, particularly for building-to-building combat, boarding actions, space station assaults, and other rough-terrain combat._

_The currently-employed form of the Wolverine mech is a jack-of-all-trades support/assault weapon, used alternately to support infantry in the field, to screen armor, or to launch close-quarters assaults in urban/space environments. Squads of Wolverines are often deployed as hunter-killer teams in urban environments, assaulting and harassing enemy formations and striking at targets of opportunity, and pilots are trained to be flexible, aggressive, and independent. _

_The Wolverine's greatest advantage is also its greatest weakness. As a jack-of-all-trades, it is a master of none and cannot provide the same level of fire support as a dedicated IFV or the assault firepower of a dedicated tank. It is also ill-suited for open field combat; outside of urban environments a Wolverine is little more effective than dismounted infantry, and cannot last long in a pitched battle against armor and air cavalry units. As a result, the Wolverine is generally restricted to urban engagements; most Wolverines are deployed via orbital drop pods alongside units of Zone Marines into urban hotspots. In boarding actions, Wolverines deploy with Zone Marines and light infantry to clear corridors and rooms, and are used to assault high-risk areas that are exposed to vacuum or radiation._

_Advanced armatures and limbs allow a Wolverine a range of movement only slightly more restricted than that of an infantryman. Pilots are fully-sealed within the Wolverine, controlling it via a second set of arm and leg attachments connected to the primary arms and legs. External data is presented in a fully three-dimensional holographic display inside the cockpit, allowing the pilot a full-range of vision and input from multiple sensors, making it difficult to catch a wary pilot off-guard. The mech is powered by a sealed hydrogen-oxygen fuel cell and features a set of thrusters and an element zero core to allow for easier movement. Used in conjunction, the thrusters and element zero core allow the Wolverine to move with startling speed, approaching speeds of 115 KPH over one hundred-meter distances._

_Like most GDI designs, the current generation of Wolverine possesses a highly modular construction. Weapons systems and other gear can be swapped out quickly and easily within a few minutes thanks to modern miniaturization, minifabrication, and omnigel technology. A Wolverine can switch from being an anti-armor ambusher with railguns to an anti-aircraft platform with guided missiles to an assault vehicle with grenade launchers and rapid-fire mass accelerators in the span of a few hours. This modularity came as a result of the Shanxi War, where the previous generations of Wolverines experienced rapid cases of wear-and-tear and were difficult to repair due to their specialized parts, resulting in "Frankenstein" mechs built from cobbled-together equipment._

* * *

_**Author's Notes:**_ The big problem with this chapter was that so much was happening at once, and the chapter itself really got away from me. Also, vehicle combat, particularly mech combat, is something I have not written a lot of. The Zaeed scenes were the biggest challenge for me for that precise reason, but once I got the hang of it, and could figure out a reasonably plausible way for Shepard to deal with Zaeed without killing him, it became a lot easier.

There is a moment in this chapter where, if it were in an actual Mass Effect game, you would see the flashing interrupt prompt. I'll let you figure out where it should be.

To respond to a couple of points brought up in a review, the kinetic barriers in ME really can do what Zaeed programmed them to do, as the barriers are really an active defense system that detects incoming projectiles of a certain mass and velocity and creates gravity pulses to repel them. It is theoretically possible to alter the settings on your kinetic barriers to not repel incoming rounds that would do no damage to your armor. Similarly, the omnitool's haptic interface does not need a hologram to work; the hologram is only there to serve as a convenient interface, and a HUD would serve the same purpose. Tactile feedback comes from gloves or subdermal implants; there's no "hard light" involved at all. This is all laid out in the Codex entries in-game. I do my research. :p

Until next chapter . . . ._  
_


	10. Chapter 10: Intervention

_**Chapter Ten: Intervention**_

"_Citadel Control, do you copy?" _The turian voice was weary and strained, whether from exhaustion or pain.

"HDC Valedictum, this is Citadel Control, we read you," replied the asari controller at the C-Sec traffic control hub. "You were out of contact for a while there. We were getting some odd radiation readings-"

"_We need assistance. My ship has taken severe damage. Half my crew is dead, life support is offline, and our engines are not responding!"_

"Understood, Valedictum." A heartbeat later, an alert flashed across the Citadel defense grid. "Repair and rescue are on the way."

* * *

_Five hours ago_

A buzzing sound brushed his senses, and Commander Helam Artanis opened his eyes. His gaze flicked around his darkened bunk on the cruiser _Valedictum_, and he sat up quickly. The bunk was small, maybe four by five meters, but was positively enormous by the standards of turian warships. He keyed on the light as he pushed himself up off the bed that took up half of his cabin. The rest was dominated by a small kitchenette, a bathroom stall, and his work desk. Wall lockers ran the length of two sides of the cabin, and a small section was left clear to hang battle honors and a couple of still-framed holos of his time at the academy. There were a couple of holos of his father, both before and after he lost an arm fighting GDI on Shanxi.

"Artanis," he spoke quickly. "Go ahead." The ship's VI responded immediately to his voice and opened the channel.

"_Calderus, sir," _replied his executive officer, the other turian's voice annoyingly chipper. The Major had been the officer on duty when Artanis had retired at the end of his shift, and obviously the shift hadn't left _him _any worse for wear.

"I was having a good dream, Major," Artanis said, shaking his head to fight off the remnants of sleep. The turian officer was a lifer, serving since his fifteenth birthday in the Hierarchy navy, so he'd become accustomed to waking fast and alert. That didn't mean he was pleasant when he woke up, and he tried to keep the immediate irritation out of his voice. "Whatever's happening better be important."

Calderus had been Artanis' junior for nearly ten years on the _Valedictum_, so the threatening tone did little to faze the other officer. He kept on without missing a beat.

"_Long-range sensors picked up an anomaly in our sector," _he reported. _"About two hours' cruise time. Right at the edge of how far our scanners can penetrate the nebula. Might be a ship."_

That chased away whatever bits of sleep were lingering in Artanis' brain. Anomalous contacts were not uncommon on patrol; one ran into everything from mildly radioactive debris to lost space probes to derelict spacecraft to asteroids with odd mineral compositions, but they were rarely worth waking the ship's commander over. But an anomaly in the Serpent Nebula surrounding the Citadel was a different matter. Standing orders for the Citadel Defense Fleet were clear: CDF ships that encountered anomalous contacts were to go to alert and investigate immediately. The Commander felt an itch in his mandibles, and they started twitching open and closed.

"Notify Citadel Control," Artanis said, and he moved toward his equipment locker. He wrenched it open and started pulling out pieces of his hardsuit. Unlike the navies of other species, the Hierarchy didn't distinguish between naval uniforms and ground force armor. Everyone wore armor while on duty on a turian ship.

"_Already done, sir," _Calderus replied.

"I knew I paid you for something, Major," Artanis mused, donning the chestpiece of his uniform. "Go to secondary alert, and have all of pilots on standby. I'll be up there in ten. Hopefully this is just a dead freighter that got lost for a few decades."

"_Want to bet a drink on that, sir?" _Calderus asked, and Artanis snorted.

"You've never paid a debt in your life, Major," he replied. "I'm on the way."

* * *

"Citadel Control to _Valedictum_, do you copy?"

"_We're holding on here, Control."_

"We read you at twelve thousand from the Citadel and not slowing."

"_My engineering crew is dead and we're having trouble flipping the ship to arrest our momentum." _Captain Artanis' voice was sounding more worried. _"Even if we could the engines are not responding. Reactors are still online, but my VI is fried so I can't regulate it."_

"Repair and rescue are inbound, ETA five minutes, Valedictum."

"_Tell them to hurry."_

* * *

_Four hours ago_

The aircar ride back to the GDI Embassy was silent at first. Shepard, Kaidan, Garrus, and the two quarians had piled into the vehicle after escaping out the tunnels, while the rest of the GDI force had withdrawn to their transports. They had slipped back into the airborne traffic lanes away from the factory district while C-Sec and the fire response teams rushed to the site, taking a slow, roundabout route back to the Embassy. It would take them more than an hour, but Shepard would prefer not to be ambushed in mid-flight. _Again_.

According to their surveillance drones the loony Wolverine pilot had recovered and escaped just moments after they'd pulled out. The REV had limped out to the cargo hauler and escaped before Garrus made the call that let C-Sec descend on the place. Citadel Security was likely going to have a field day with the mercenary survivors and data left behind in the wake of their raid, but Shepard didn't terribly care what they found. She had both of her objectives secure.

Across from the Commando, Tali'Zorah was, for lack of a better term, fussing over Kal'Reegar's suit, apparently checking his seals and vitals. The male quarian was tolerating his comrade's inspection with the patience of a career soldier. Beside Shepard, Garrus was quietly speaking into his earpiece with someone from C-Sec, no doubt using his authority as a Spectre to keep them from prying too much. Kaidan loomed to her other side, submachinegun Werewolf sitting in his lap and alert eyes peering out the window on his side and keeping an eye out for other threats. Considering her recent adventures in aircar hijackings, Shepard appreciated the thought.

She watched with curiosity as Tali'Zorah finished her inspection. She knew that quarians were a tight-knit group, and that the group that had been with these two had be friends and comrades. Kal'Reegar was also still recovering from the chemical cocktail they'd injected him with, and combined with their losses it helped explain why Tali'Zorah was being so doting on her companion. She was afraid of losing someone else close to her.

"Are you hurt?" Shepard asked as the quarian settled back down. kal'Reegar shook his head.

"No, Commander," he said, and sat up a little straighter in his chair. "Nothing a few hours to let these stims and antibiotics run their course won't fix, anyhow."

"We appreciate the assistance, Commander," Tali added. "Both of us owe you for the rescue."

"Hell, I owe you more than that, Tali," Kal'Reegar said. "You saved my ass too, so I owe the both of you for gettin' my sorry self out."

"Don't worry about it, Kal-" she started, but he raised a hand.

"Don't pull that 'it was nothing' crap on me," Kal'Reegar cut her off. "You went in there by yourself against a small army with nothing but your suit and your omnnitool. That's either terminally stupid or brave enough to make the ancestors proud, and I know you're not an idiot. Ma'am."

There was a couple of moments of silence, and though Shepard couldn't see the female's expression, surprise was clearly evident in her body language, along with maybe a bit of embarrassment. Quarians were oddly similar to humans, in that regard.

"Thank you, Kal," she said after finally finding her voice.

"Just setting the record straight, ma'am," Kal'Reegar said with a nod. "Now, if we're done with the atmo-sharing party, I'd say the Commander here has some questions."

"I do," Shepard said with a nod.

"You're probably after the intel," Kal'Reegar continued, and Shepard nodded. Tali let out a quiet sigh.

"I don't know why I thought we could keep that a secret," she muttered. "Everyone on the Citadel seems to know about what we have."

"Stop blaming yourself, ma'am," Kal'Reegar grunted.

"What did you find?" Kaidan asked. "You had to have something important if this many people were after it."

The two quarians hesitated, and Kal'Reegar tapped the underside of his helmet, a gesture which made Tali'Zorah nod. A couple of moments passed, and Shepard thought she could hear them speaking quietly, maybe conferring over subvocals instead of suit speakers. Finally, Tali shifted her shoulders and started speaking.

"The Admiralty Board received notice of geth movements beyond the Perseus Veil several months ago," she said. "They decided to send a recon team to assess what the geth were doing and gather information."

"Lot of reports of geth activity in the Armstrong Cluster," Kal'Reegar said. "That was where we went to do our first recon work."

"Armstrong is close to GDI territory," Shepard said, frowning. That was a largely uncolonized section of space near the Terminus Systems. Maybe a few small independent colonies and corporate research stations or military observation posts, but nothing large-scale. "Why weren't we notified of this?"

"Not privy to Admiralty Board decisions, ma'am," Kal'Reegar replied, his words crisp. "Your Directors might want to ask them why they kept quiet about it. All I know is we were sent to check out what they were doing."

"We determined a substantial fleet force was securing several systems in the area," Tali'Zorah continued, pulling the subject back on track. "A number of frigates and at least six cruisers, with several hundred other transport craft. They were apparently establishing communications relay stations, supply dumps, local mining facilities, small factories, and data hubs."

Shepard's brow furrowed in thought.

"For an organic force, that would be a prelude to establishing colonies and military occupation in an unsecured section of space," she said. "Do the geth operate the same way?"

"We can't really say," Tali replied. "Geth construction tends to be rapid and large-scale, but we've never observed operations beyond the Veil. But it does look like they're preparing to support a larger force moving into the area."

"Admirals decided that we needed to have a closer look," Kal'Reegar added. "We raided a data hub and downloaded as much as we could."

"They didn't wipe the hub to prevent that?" Shepard asked.

"Yeah," Kal'Reegar said. "An overt attack would trigger an automatic wipe. That's why most of the team staged a diversion on a supply dump a hundred klicks out while Tali'Zorah here snuck inside the hub and snatched all the data she could."

Shepard raised an eyebrow, while Kaidan chuckled. Garrus, who had been listening quietly to the entire conversation, chimed in.

"Impressive," he said. "From what we know of the geth, that would require quite a bit of skill."

"The hub started wiping itself anyway," Tali said, moving on. Her tone indicated she was uncomfortable with the praise. "We lost some of the data when the geth opt-flashed it, but we managed to recover a substantial amount of information on geth patrols, fleet movements, and high-priority operations. We're still trying to decrypt it, but this is the most data we've recovered from the geth in centuries."

"And you're selling it on the Citadel," Kaidan said, his voice deadpan.

"Like I said," Kal'Reegar grunted, annoyance creeping into his tone, "Not my choice. The Admirals just said to-"

"We received an offer for the data," Tali cut in. "Valuable technology that would help the Migrant Fleet in exchange for what we pulled from that hub. It was too good an offer to pass up."

"And you didn't pass this data on to GDI?" Kaidan asked. "We could have-"

"Alenko," Shepard said, injecting a slight rebuke into her tone, and he went quiet. "The Quarian Admiralty Board doesn't answer to the GDI Director's Board. If they want to withhold intelligence, that's their decision." She looked back to the quarians. "But we need that data now that we're fighting the geth and the Scrin."

"The drives with the data are secured at a drop point," Tali said. "I can direct you to it once we're safe."

"The Embassy is only a few minutes away," Shepard said. "Once you're there, you'll be as safe as you can get in this station."

"Who offered to buy the data?" Garrus asked. Tali shook her head.

"I don't know," she replied. Shepard kept her expression neutral, watching the quarian's body language, and she noticed Kal'Reegar tensing up next to his companion. "The price was substantial enough to task an entire marine contingent to protect the data, but maybe that was what tipped them off."

She was hiding something. Shepard momentarily considering getting more aggressive, and suspected that Tali might fold if she pushed harder, but looking at Kal'Reegar made her reconsider.

"Was it the Brotherhood of Nod?" Garrus asked, and Tali paused. Kal'Reegar got even more tense. "I found laser modules on your companions' weaponry. Nod-designed modules, if I'm not mistaken."

"We trade with Nod colonies, yeah," Kal'Reegar replied quickly. "But we weren't selling the data to Nod, if that's what you're asking. I don't know who it was, but I know it _wasn't _Brotherhood."

Then how did Kane know about the quarians and their intel? Another mystery she would need to dig into now. Dammit, who could she really trust here? Kane had his own motivations, Saren's mercenaries were everywhere, plus whoever hired the REV pilot, and maybe some other group that the quarians were being tight-lipped about.

This was giving Shepard a hell of a headache.

* * *

"_Valedictum_, rescue is en route. What happened out there?"

"_Control, we came across an old ship. Not sure what it was, but it had a hell of a self-defense system. Chewed us up before we blew it apart. We've been limping back, running up to cruising thrust. I'd send you anything we had but our computers are fried and nav is offline."_

"Understood. Hang in there, we're on the way."

* * *

_Four hours ago_

Artanis strode onto the dimly-lit command deck of the _Valedictum_, and his eyes flicked across the crewmen. As with most turian ships, the combat information center was located significantly aft of the cockpit, with a line of seats running down the length of the tapering deck where crewmen manned heat management systems, weapons and operations stations, and communication and sensor posts. Human ship designs favored banks of crewmen with the commander moving among them, which also matched salarian doctrine. Asari deck designs were less standardized and more haphazard. They called it "personalized" but Artanis thought it sloppy and undisciplined.

"Sir," Calderus said as he saw the commander step onto the bridge. He inclined his head toward his CO, which was all the Hierarchy really required. Humans demanded so many displays from their troops, and while the Hierarchy had their own gestures of respect, they were more muted. A nod of acknowledgement, a crisp report, and decisive stance while delivering said report was all a proper turian commander needed. Maybe humans needed so much formality because they ascribed to that oddly-prevalent notion that not everyone had to give part of their life in service to the state, yet still insisted on maintaining such a powerful military.

Artanis' mandibles flattened against his lower jaw in consternation. His mind tended to wander a bit immediately after waking. He shook it away and focused on the situation at hand.

"Report," he ordered as he strode up to the command platform overlooking the CIC. Calderus tapped a key and the central display began to change. Artanis' XO had similar facial coloration and markings to his commander: gray-brown skin tone with white and blue slashes down the nose and the mandible. Artanis had a bit of red cutting beneath his eyes as well.

"I deployed drones out in a thirty kilometer radius," Calderus said. "Improved resolution didn't show us much more than we already know." He gestured to the central hologram, which shifted to display a series of fuzzy sensor returns. There was definitely a solid object out there, going by the sensor scans, but precisely what was unidentifiable.

"No emissions?" Artanis asked, and Calderus shook his head.

"No change in the object's position either," Calderus added. He brought up several more images, showing differing timestamps; the object had not moved any appreciable distance.

"So we're likely looking at a derelict," Artanis said with a shrug. "Might be of value to an archaeological team once we haul it back in."

"There was one odd thing, sir," Calderus added, and he tapped another couple of keys. A different sensor feed appeared, and Artanis' eyes narrowed as much as they could for a turian.

"Those are charged particles," he said, looking over the feed. A whole cloud, in fact, of charged gases from the nebula surrounding the object.

"Curious," Artanis said, nodding. He stepped past Calderus onto the platform, and the crew who noticed the unspoken shift in command looked up, inclined their heads, and went back to work.

"Communications, open a channel to Citadel Control," he ordered. "Advise them that we are moving to investigate the anomaly."

"Doing so now, sir," the comms officer replied.

"Helm, lay in a course for that contact, half speed," he ordered. "All personnel are to go to standby alert. Let's see what's out there."

* * *

"_Control, this is rescue team, callsign Halat," _came a filtered voice, with the wheezing associated with a volus. _"On station."_

"Halat, close to target _Valedictum _and offer rescue and repair. Priority is on retaking control of the engines. _Valedictum _is on a collision course with the outer Citadel shell."

"_Acknowledged, Control. We are closing."_

* * *

_Five hours and thirty minutes ago_

The apartment was sandwiched within a complex on the lower levels of Zakera Ward, in a section of the station arm that had higher-than-average security and privacy. The apartment building didn't have much a higher standard of living, but the presence of security alone was enough to jack up the prices significantly. Fortunately, some people didn't have to pay rents, and the security served to keep out more than just the riff-raff. Some noted with curiosity that the guards were all human, in a ward where there were plenty of other species available to fill the ranks, but suspicious was blunted through efficient service and the periodic bribe.

He'd doffed his armor and changed back into civilian clothes en route back to the safehouse, and felt uncomfortable as he rode the elevator up to the secured apartment. He didn't like _not_ walking around without at least a suit of fabric armor to supplement the dermal layers, but at least he could wear his concealed weapons inside the building, and a pistol on his hip thanks to a carefully-forged permit. He walked in near-silence, despite his sheer size and bulk, his steps perfectly balanced to minimize noise.

The apartment door was sealed, and a quick check with the security VI showed that it had not been tampered with. He unlocked and stepped into the dim room, glancing around the small, spare apartment. It had little more than a small bedroom, a wall dedicated to a kitchen, and a couple of cheap sofas around a small display projector. He ignored the rest of the darkened room and cut across the to the bathroom offshoot. He pressed two spots on the wall of the bathroom, stepped back into the apartment, and crossed it to the opposite side. He waved his hand over a blank spot on the wall, tapped two more points about a meter apart, and then pressed his hand flat against another point on the wall two meters down.

A dozen holes the size of needle heads appeared in the ceramic wall, and tiny beams of light played over his body: several over his face, two directly into his eyes that left spots on his retinas despite their augments, and others over the weapons he wore. The biometric scanner beneath his palm glowed as the lights finished the initial verification process. Fingerprint scans ensued, and the surface of the device took an unobtrusive skin scraping.

"Voice identification required," demanded the empty, genderless voice of the VI.

"Locke," he replied. The accent was nearly impossible to place; he'd picked up bits and pieces from dozens of environments over his lifetime, and the vocal augments let him scramble it up even further. With a thought, he set the augment in his voicebox to the standard pattern this unit was programmed to acknowledge. "Daycode: Slade, Sierra, Two, One, Nightmare."

"Voice identification confirmed."

The wall in front of him split apart, pulling open with complete silence, and he stepped into the room beyond. It was pitch-black, but as the doors sealed behind him, terminals and holographic displays lit up. The chamber was shaped like a half-circle, with displays and haptic controls flaring up at waist height on the curving wall. He settled down in the chair in the middle of the room, augmented blue eyes moving over the awakening terminals, and navigated through their boot screens and status reports.

Locke brought up the quantum entanglement interface and fired it up, then settled back to wait for the response. A display in the corner advised him that all security countermeasures had been fully activated, ensuring that this conversation would be as private as human technology - GDI, Nod, or otherwise - could manage. He suspected that even the STG or Shadow Broker would be hard-pressed to monitor this site.

The answer on the far end came in about the time it would take a man to knock back a finger of brandy and take a long drag on a cigarette.

"_Report," _came a garbled, genderless voice.

"The quarian issue has been resolved," Locke said. "Not as satisfactorily as we had preferred, but it was dealt with."

"_What happened down there?" _the voice on the other end asked.

"GDI intervened, as anticipated, but with Citadel support," Locke explained. He kept the satisfaction out of his voice as he remembered. Old ties still held weight, and watching a GDI force move with such efficient violence was oddly uplifting. If only it had been done without Citadel dogs padding alongside humans…

"We didn't anticipate the speed of the response, however," he continued. "It looks like a Spectre was involved, which explains how the Citadel found out so quickly, but I didn't expect they'd be cooperating."

"_Until today, there was no reason to," _the voice replied, and paused. Maybe half a drag long, he guessed. _"Who else was involved?"_

"The other surviving quarian, and a mercenary operating a Wolverine, who I believe was working for the Shadow Broker," Locke continued. "There was a conflict between the GDI-Citadel unit and the Broker agent. I deemed the situation too volatile to intervene with the resources at hand, so I maintained my distance. The quarians were extracted by GDI and are now en route to their embassy. I have eyes tracking them."

"_Good," _replied the voice. Locke though he heard a swallow. _"It is unfortunate that we don't have exclusive access to their intel, but we never finalized that deal in the first place. We have other assets in place to acquire the data."_

"Do you want me to remain on alert?" Locke asked, scratching his jaw. The subdermal armor sometimes itched, especially after the last iteration had been engineered and injected.

"_For the moment, yes," _the voice said. _"Keep your team on standby in case something else happens. But be ready to pull out of the Citadel quickly if needed. Once the Citadel and GDI secure that data, there will be a scramble to secure or destroy Saren's assets. I want to capitalize on that."_

"Understood," Locke replied, and a moment later the call was terminated.

He tapped a few orders out to his agents, then rose and headed for his personal armory. He'd need to adjust his loadout; he'd been geared for covert action, but he suspected that he would need to switch to something heavier if an intervention was necessary.

* * *

"_Control, spike in emissions from the reactor! Tell that rescue team to wave off!"_

"We're not picking up anything from here, _Valdedictum_."

"_My reactor is getting dangerously close to overloading! Get everyone out of the blast radius!"_

"Halat, did you read that last?"

"_We heard it, Control. Reactor shouldn't be doing that. Standard step-down procedure should prevent it unless someone messed with the automated control systems. Combat damage might have inflicted it."_

"Your call, Halat."

"_Fusion reactors going into overload do not scare us, ma'am. We're closing in."_

* * *

_Three hours ago_

They were at twenty thousand kilometers when Artanis ordered an all-stop. The _Valedictum's _engines, pointing toward the unidentified object, burned with an intense pulse and reversed their forward momentum. The cruiser lumbered to a halt.

"Major, what am I looking at?" he asked, leaning closer to the display.

"A huge-ass mystery wrapped up in a cloud of charged particles, sir," Calderus replied, mandibles twitching in curiosity. He gestured to the display. "Look at that. Scopes are indicating that those are the usual gas and dust particles from the nebula. But they're moving in regular patterns around the object, and they're charged ions. Never seen anything like that, except . . . ."

Artanis waited for his executive officer to continue, but Calderus' eyes remained locked on the display before them.

"You love the dramatic trailing, don't you?" he asked the major, who nodded.

"Someday, someone will review our bridge logs. I want them to be properly suspenseful."

"Where did you see this behavior before, O glorious and revered actor?"

Calderus' mandibles tightened as he apparently sobered up and got more serious.

"On Earth," he replied. "Salarian science report on atmospheric phenomena on one of the most dangerous planets in the galaxy. An ion storm, coming in off what they called the "red" zones where tiberium was thickest. Massive clouds of charged particles caused by whatever that crap is. Sweep out from the "red" zones and into their more civilized areas, shooting off pillars of lightning and enough ECM to fry improperly shielded electronics. Atmospherics looked exactly like that."

"And you know this because . . . ."

"Non-classified, correlates with GDI science released, but an independent study," Calderus said. "I wrote up a thesis on anomalous atmospheric phenomena a few years ago. Rejected, though, which is why I'm still on this rustbucket with a dead-ender like you. Sir."

"And with that attitude, you'll stick around," Artanis grunted in reply. "Salarians had access to the ever-sacred Sol system?"

"They had access to a science ship that had a platoon of GDI Marines on board and was being escorted by three cruisers and a dreadnought with every gun pointed at their faces," Calderus replied. "Diplomatic outreach at the end of a gun barrel. Human mindset, I guess."

"Were it anyone else, I'd call it paranoia, but salarians . . . ." Artanis said, then shook his head. This banter was getting them nowhere.

"So, what the hell could be causing a tiberium-related phenomena all the way out here?" Artanis asked, his words pensive. He stared at the display.

The object had not moved, with no change in relative position between it and anything else in the nebula. It was in orbit around Widow, but it was deeply suspicious regardless; no artificial object had such a natural orbit unless it was precisely planned or very, very ancient. The ion storm surging around it, yet the lack of detectable emissions, indicated the technology was extremely unusual by Citadel standards. Prothean? Possibly.

Whatever it was, it warranted a closer look before he made a final call. Especially if it was tiberium-related. Anything that would give the Citadel in general a chance to match that massive human economic

"VI," he ordered, "Sound general quarters. Major Antillar is to launch his squadron and position them in screening posture two hundred kilometers ahead. Spread the sensor drones out another hundred kilometers. Helm, once they are in position, ahead at half speed. Weapons at full charge. Comms, drop buoys at every five thousand kilometers. That thing so much as twitches, I want us to report it back to Citadel Control."

He exhaled as the _Valedictum's _crew responded to his commands, and kept his eyes locked on the anomaly on his display.

What secrets was it hiding?

* * *

"_This is Halat, docking now."_

"_Get your people out of here, Control!"_

"Valedictum, you are less than three thousand kilometers from the Citadel with an overloading reactor according to your report. We can either try to take back engineering and force an all-stop or we can blow your ship out of space. I'd much prefer the former."

"_Understood."_

"_Halat to control, hatches are not responding. Cutting in now."_

"_Halat, _Valedictum_. Be advised limited atmosphere inside, most of my crew are dead. Once you get inside you will be on your own."_

"_Copy that."_

* * *

_Thirty-five minutes ago_

He leaned on the railing overlooking Zakera Ward, expression pensive. With his hood down, his face was clearly visible, lit by distant Widow and the ever-shifting mosaic of light that made up the Citadel ward. Strange shadows constantly played over his face.

_Report from Delta-Sigma Group: observation of extraction of high value individuals from warehouse by GDI agents. Confirmed presence of: Spectre Garrus Vakarian, Commander Shepard. Associate list appended. Currently en route to GDI Embassy._

Miranda Lawson stood behind him, stock still. She still wore her black, form-fitting suit of armor fabric, but a holograpic visor lit up before her eyes, feeding her data reports. She paid them an absent bit of attention; long experience, neural implants, and some expensive, targeted genetic adjustments to her brain let her multitask efficiently, so she could read the incoming data and keep an idle eye on her leader.

_Report from Agent Gabriel: Shadow Broker agent identified. Human mercenary Zaeed Massani. Three tours, GDI Marine Corps. Founded Blue Suns mercenary group, deposed. Currently freelance mercenary, no loyalties. Most recent operation: Verge War, attachment to penal battalion. Detailed dossier appended._

She never understood what was going through the mind of Kane. He was an inscrutable mystery, and while his cryptic ways of talking gave her glimpses into his thought processes, she didn't pretend to truly understand him. What she _did_ know was that she owed him her life, and that he was loyal to those who showed him loyalty in turn. The Brotherhood did good work, work that belied GDI propaganda, and she'd seen the unstable underbelly of human society, along with the corruption that permeated GDI.

_Report from Agent Coulson: Citadel security has secured warehouse/factory site. All surviving mercenary personnel taken into custody. Attempting to gain detailed dossiers on surviving mercenaries. Possible recruitment opportunities appended._

The Brotherhood, after all, had not been the ones to create her. GDI-funded scientists had, and had been responsible for the hell that was the first sixteen years of her life. When Kane offered her an out, with a couple of Serpent gunships proving covering fire, she'd accepted.

_Report from Observation Team Oracle: Confirmed presence of unidentified observer elements outside warehouse/factory. Detailed data regarding units appended. High probability of association with Salarian Special Tasks group._

But twenty years as a Nod agent, ten of them as Kane's personal aide and troubleshooter, had bought her precious little comprehension of the man who stood before her, black eyes regarding the Citadel with inscrutable analysis.

"You shouldn't stand out in the open like that," she said after a few moments. "Now that we've gone public, assassins will be lining up to take a shot at you." She counted at least forty easy vantage points for a sniper, at a single quick glance.

"I do not fear snipers," Kane murmured. "I have lost count of the number of times I have been killed." A small smile spread over his features. "Let them try. I'd welcome a chance to truly prove who I am to the unbelievers."

"And in the process," Miranda said, drying her voice, "I would have to clean up a very dreadful mess."

"The kinetic barrier would slow the round substantially," Kane said with a shrug. "Enough to leave a clean entry wound. Not very much blood would be shed."

"True enough," she replied. A nagging part of her wanted to append an honorific when speaking to him, but nothing sufficed. Kane had told her before that he did not care for the honorifics others tried to append to him. Despite the religious aura he exuded, calling him something like "holy one" or "your eminence" just seemed . . . Inadequate. Or perhaps petty. Therefore, she limited herself to speaking to him like an ordinary person, despite his status.

_Report from Observation Unit Fisher: Citadel Defense Force alert issued. Damaged CDF ship returning from patrol, reporting fired upon by unknown enemy. Rescue and repair responding. Details appended._

"Citadel Defense just issued an alert," she said, tone shifting back to business. Kane straightened, and his right hand waved over his left wrist. His omnitool responded, but didn't light up. He could apparently interact with the device without needing to see the keys; Miranda suspected optical implants or a direct neural interface.

"I see," he said after a few seconds. "Valedictum. Truian cruiser. Heavy damage, unknown attacker." He frowned for a moment, then nodded. "As expected."

"I doubt that," she murmured. "No way you could have expected this."

"Not this precisely,' he said with a shrug and a smile. "But don't tell anyone I said that."

Miranda hated the smoke-and-mirrors game they had to play. Kane liked to keep his enemies off-balance by appearing to know everything, which was far from the truth. The whole idea behind breaking into the Citadel communications system had been part of the charade to make everyone wonder just how deep Nod's fingers reached. If anyone suspected how little they really knew . . . .

"They were going to retaliate at some point," Kane said, his voice distracted. He was still reading the data. "But I didn't expect it to be so swiftly."

"An attack on a cruiser with no known connections to any of the players doesn't seem rational, though," Miranda said, and he nodded quickly.

"Indeed. But this turian vessel is . . . Not the objective." He brought a hand up to his chin, eyes narrowing. His gaze then snapped to hers.

"Get our available response assets moving," he said quickly. "We don't have much time before they strike."

* * *

"_Control, Halat. We are inside. Severe internal damage." _The volus paused. _"See those burn marks? That looks like GARDIAN or thermite. Maybe a particle weapon or plasma flamethrowers?"_

"Focus on the repairs, Halat."

"_Copy that, Control. Making our way to engineering. Careful with those bodies, Quintius." _A few moments passed. _"We're getting close to engineering. I'm not getting any indicators of an overloading reactor on my . . . standby."_

"Halat? Report."

"_Salaie, recalibrate those sensors. I'm getting weird radiation markers here. Nonstandard."_

"_Cap, I have some movement."_

"_Quintus, double check your scanners. Make sure its not a body one of us sent spinning on the way down here."_

"_Yeah, that's got to be it. I got nothing else here."_

"_Okay, Control, everything looks clear here. Breaching engineering."_

* * *

The _Valedictum _closed to several thousand kilometers from the anomaly, at the outer edge of effective cruiser firing range, the cruiser flipping around to bring its spinal weaponry to bear on the object. It didn't technically _stop_, but rather slowed to a near-crawl of a few hundred meters per-second. The cruiser then flipped over, angling its passage to that it sidled past the anomaly, rotating to keep the main guns on-target and carefully firing thrusters to maintain a steady distance and match the object's orbit. It was a delicate dance, matching the anomaly's speed while keeping the guns locked on the orbiting object, but the _Valedictum_'s crew had done it plenty of times before.

This close, with the fighters and drones feeding incoming data while spread out over several hundred kilometers around the cruiser, the images came in with impressive clarity. Artanis could have counted the divots in an enemy ship's hull painting with this kind of resolution - or he would, if the swirling, blue and black clouds of charged ions raging around the anomaly didn't block most of his sensor feeds.

"Getting limited data on the object," reported the sensor officer. "Estimated length is six hundred meters. Cannot get an accurate mass reading. No element zero masses detected. No emissions save those put out by the ion cloud. No data on hull composition."

Artanis leaned closer, practically putting his eyes through the holographic display of his command pedestal. He manipulated the visual feeds carefully, trying to get a good view of the object through the obscuring clouds. The shape beyond seemed to made of dark metal, and he thought he saw ridged, metallic spines emerging from a long, narrow structure that was almost certainly a spacecraft.

"Citadel Control, are you seeing this?" Artanis asked. Static washed back over the line, and he glanced at his comms officer.

"Cleaning it up," the officer replied. "Lot of interference. The comm buoys are glitching out."

The turian captain's jaws clenched, a mixture of anxiety and displeasure. The smaller comm buoys were standard issue among CDF ships, using lasers and mass effect corridors to transfer data point-to-point since the nebula interfered with radio transmissions. They had a shorter range than regular interstellar comm buoys, and even with their specialized tech they were still not perfect for long-range communications in Widow's notoriously troublesome gas clouds. Still, they shouldn't have been completely washed out with interference like this.

"You think they're jamming us?" asked Calderus, and Artanis clicked his mandibles.

"If there's even a "they" involved," Artanis replied. "This could be an entirely automated process. Or an unintentional side effect of the technology involved. We should assume nothing."

"Which is why we're approaching with all weapons armed, interceptors out, and shields cycling." Calderus' metallic voice was flat and dry.

"Correct," Artanis replied with a sharp nod. "We'll circle it and try to collect more data before moving closer. I don't want-"

"Captain!" reported the comms officer, his voice peaking in alarm. "Comm buoys are not reporting!"

Artanis' eyes snapped to the display. The buoys's tiny markers on the tactical display were suddenly gone.

"ECM?" he called.

"Interference is building up, but . . . ." the sensors officer paused. "Emission spike! High energy radiation emissions coming from object!"

"Full alert!" Artanis called. Warning klaxons erupted almost before he finished speaking. "Interceptors in defensive screen! Helm, get us at least fifteen thousand from anomaly and power up mass effect drive! Comms, get me Citadel Control, I don't care how!"

His sense of gravity shifted as the cruiser came about, rolling in space and firing its engines. The sheer mass of the warship belied its maneuverability, but even so, it would take precious seconds for the _Valedictum _to turn its engines away from the suddenly-active anomaly. The crewmen below were talking quickly, hands flying over their haptic displays. The bridge lights dimmed, and a few moments later the tug of gravity faded almost completely, the mass effect fields normally devoted to simulating planetary conditions deactivating to conserve power for combat. The _Valedictum_ was not like one of those expensive, top-of-the-line warships like that turian-human prototype ship, whatever it was called; those ships had power to spare and could keep their crews under normal gravity conditions. Artanis had to make do with the magnetic clamps in his armor.

"Captain!" Calderus called, from the front of the bridge; he'd moved there as soon as Artanis had issued a full alert. "Ion cloud expanding!"

Artanis glanced to the display again, mind racing to take in everything. He banished the pounding sense of fear trying to take purchase in his gut with the easy efficiency of a lifetime turian soldier. Calderus was right: the ion cloud surrounding the object had expanded rapidly, doubling in size. Arcs of blue-white lightning streaked through the cloud, the darkening gases and dust swirling faster and more violently. Somehow, though, he was now getting a better sensor return, if only from thermal and electromagnetic scanners.

There was movement in the cloud. The spined shape was turning toward them, and the sensors were now definitely returning data on mass and some information on hull composition - as if it had been using something to conceal itself from conventional scanners. Energy spikes flared along some of those spines, and he saw movement on the ship's hull. Parts of it seemed to be breaking off, emissions blazing from the as they flew away. Strike craft - bombers or interceptors, he couldn't be sure.

What Artanis was certain of was that he knew who this ship belonged to. Between Calderus' assessment of the nature of the ion cloud and the general shape, he could draw a conclusion, which was only confirmed by the sudden ability to detect the ship. He'd attended the briefings, and while the Hierarchy had been skeptical of the threat reports from GDI, he'd taken their warnings to heart. The ship had been using phasing technology to hide itself from his sensors; there was no other way to explain the sudden shift in his readings. That meant only one thing.

"Charging mass effect drive," reported the pilot. "Five seconds. Three."

The Scrin cruiser opened fire.

* * *

"_Control, Halat. My crew have secured engineering. This place is open to vacuum. We'll need to run some bypasses to regain control of thrusters and engines, but the reactor is intact. No signs of any damage that the captain was reporting."_

"_Valedictum_, do you read? Where was that spike coming from?" A few moments passed. "_Valedictum_? Captain Artanis? Report."

"_Life support likely went out, Control. We're bringing up internal diagnostics now and bypassing damaged power connections. Give me three and we can power up thrusters enough to flip the ship. Five and we can bring her to a stop."_

"_Valedictum _is less than a thousand from the Citadel, Halat. Hurry."

"_We've got this, Control. Let my people work."_

* * *

_Five minutes ago_

They had landed in one of the secluded hangars on the second level of the Embassy more than an hour previously. Shepard didn't want to expose the quarians any further than they already were.

"Alright, Tali," Shepard said as they watched through the quarantine glass as Kal'Reegar received a more extensive medical exam than what they'd managed on the hovercar. The masked male bore the attentions of Dr. Chloe Michel, the Embassy's doctor, with his usual stoicsm.

The GDI Embassy's infirmary had a sterile isolation room which was used for treating people with weakened immune systems or tiberium mutations. It was also ideal for treating quarians, as long as the doctor wore a full-body sterile examination hardsuit like Michel. Parts of Kal'Reegar's suit had been detached around his upper arms and the center of his torso, exposing pale quarian flesh that seemed not too dissimilar to human skin. There were bruises and track marks from where the mercs had injected him, and a poorly-treated gunshot wound in his left leg.

"What aren't you telling us?"

The quarian stiffened beside her. Shepard had fully disconnected her helmet, letting her hair loose, but she was still clad in her imposing, angular combat armor. Likely she would be wearing it for a while; she didn't want to imagine how she smelled right now.

They were alone in the observation room. Kaidan and Jacob had headed down to the armory to rearm, while Garrus was giving the rundown of the operation to Havoc. The pair were likely planning the next step of their campaign against Saren, with extensive uses of the words "strategic" and "collateral." Without the others around, Maybe Tali would relax. Or maybe isolating her would make her easier to intimidate. That was half the reason why Shepard had ordered Kal'Reegar to get a second examination from Dr. Michel.

"The people that we made the deal with, you mean?" she said quietly, and Shepard nodded. She shifted her weight a bit closer to Tali, keeping her expression even. Tali did not react immediately, instead watching Kal'Reegar's treatment.

"I think you owe us more than just vague information about whoever they were," Shepard said. She looked to Kal'Reegar, and prepared a punch right into the gaping, painful wound she suspected Tali bore. "Especially if they might have been responsible for this."

Tali was silent for several moments, but Shepard knew she'd hit the quarian precisely. She blamed herself for what happened to her fellows. Her _friends._ Her three-fingered hands opened and closed a couple of times, and Shepard heard her take a deep breath.

"The Migrant Fleet has been expanding its military buildup," Tali said after a few moments. "Arming civilian ships more extensively, buying more military-grade warships. Aligning with GDI hasn't bought us much goodwill among the Citadel species, but we're already pariahs to begin with, so no loss there." Her words became a bit more bitter. "Breakaway flotillas get attacked more often by Terminus or batarian pirates because of your war with the Hegemony."

"That can't be all of it," Shepard said, pressing gently. "The Migrant Fleet is the most well-armed navy in the galaxy. Pirates wouldn't force a large-scale up-arming."

"No," Tali said, shaking her head. "The Admiralty Board wants to try to assault through the Veil and retake Rannoch from the geth."

Shepard nodded, hiding her confusion. Hadn't the act of retaking their homeworld been part of the quarians' long-term goals since they were driven off their homeworld?

"This, all of it," she said, waving a hand, "was part of that. Some of the Admirals are drumming up support for a push into the Veil, but others oppose it. They want a safe planet to put down our noncombatant population and settle. The Admirals who want war, Han'Gerrell and my father, they need an excuse. The geth activity in Ar,strong, and the attack on Eden Prime are giving them what they want."

"Your father is an Admiral?" Shepard asked, careful to keep from pulling the conversation off track. Knowing more about Tali would give her more to work with.

"Yes," Tali said, her filtered voice quiet. She sounded _young_. "No pressure on me to perform, right? The raid on the geth information hub was part of the general push toward war. We needed information. But we also needed weaponry suitable to fight the geth, and human technology has advantages. Our access to GDI weaponry is limited, and we don't have human fabrication technology."

"So when someone offered you fabricators and GDI weaponry, you jumped at the chance to buy it with the intel from the hub," Shepard said, and Tali nodded. "Who was selling?"

"The Admiralty Board had dealt with them before, though we didn't know it at the time. We thought they were just individual black market dealers," Tali said. She shrugged. "I don't know much, but we picked up their name once we pieced everything together. They call themselves "Phoenix." Some human mythology?"

"Yeah," Shepard said, nodding. "Never heard of them," she lied, while wracking her brain for where she'd heard that name mentioned before. It was familiar, but where had she heard or read about it? And whatever they were, they were able to supply fabrication tech and weaponry on a scale that drew the interest of the Migrant Fleet, to the point that one of their Admirals was willing to send his own daughter on the mission to acquire it.

"What about the intel you were going to sell?" Shepard asked.

"I left it in a drop point," Tali said, straightening. "In Zakera Ward. I can give you the coordinates, but-"

Klaxons erupted from the level above.

* * *

"_Control, we have thrust. Flipping. Standby. And there we go."_

"_Ready for counterthrust, Cap."_

"_Burn it."_

"_Firing counterthrust. Momentum slowing. Slowing. Slowing. And . . . Stop."_

"_Less than twelve kilometers clearance, Quintus. Work faster next time."_

"_But where's the drama in efficiency?"_

"_I'm not paid for drama, Quintus. Control, this is Halat, we have stopped the Valedictum, setting speed to match Citadel orbit."_

"Good job, Halat. Additional rescue is being mobilized."

"_Okay, people, let's see if we can find anyone else alive in this wreck."_

"_Cap, I got more of those weird radiation markers."_

"_Hm. I see them too. Keep your eyes open for malfunctioning equipment. Last thing any of us needs is-"_

Static washed over the radio line.

* * *

_Three hours ago_

Artanis barely saw it. There was a sudden flicker of motion, and a streaking, high-speed object resembling a spike that the scanners barely registered lanced from the ion cloud and headed straight toward his ship, covering the thousands of kilometers between them in less than two seconds.

The helmsman saw it too, and the _Valedictum _jerked, but the cruiser was no frigate or fighter.

The shot impacted their aft shields and exploded with nuclear-scale force. The _Valedictum _shook violently, and Artanis was nearly flung off his feet. There were shouts of shock and terror, and Artanis struggled to regain his balance.

"Damage report!" he shouted, bringing up a ship schematic.

"Barriers disabled, recharging," reported the ship's VI. "Significant damage to aft sections." A scrolling list of damaged decks and compartments ran past the schematic, which showed practically the entire rear quarter of the _Valedictum _as glowing a dangerous, bloody blue. "Seventeen crew confirmed killed, twelve more unaccounted for. Engines at seventeen percent power. Mass effect drive damaged and inoperable. Reactor connections severed."

Artanis stared, dumbfounded. What the hell had they just been shot by? The damage to the aft section looked less like a hull hit by a mass accelerator round and more like someone had detonated a tremendous flak shell a hundred meters from their hull. But what kind of shrapnel or flak explosive impacted hard enough to completely smash a cruiser's barriers and still have enough energy to virtually shred a quarter of the ship? And what did they load that shot with? A nuclear warhead?

"Helm, flip us around!" Artanis ordered, grabbing the railing beneath the display. "Guns, target that ship! Hit it with everything you have! Broadside, spinal, everything!"

The _Valdictum _was crippled in terms of mobility and couldn't call for help in this signal-blocking nebula. But the cruiser still had claws. It trundled around, thrusters firing, while still careening along on its previous course. The ship shuddered as its broadside mass accelerator turrets targeted the alien vessel inside the ion cloud and began belching fire at it. The interceptor squadron had come about and were engaging the enemy strike craft as they screamed out of the ion cloud. Blue bolts lanced from the Scrin fighters, and dark blue shields flared as they traded fire with the interceptors' cannons and missiles.

The _Valedictum's _lighter broadside fire poured into the ion cloud and the spiky mass of the alien warship within. Artanis watched closely, and saw lightning bursting from the ion cloud, intersecting with many of the rounds and shattering them with eruptions of brilliant light. Missiles fired from the turian interceptors were also being blown apart by the lightning bolts.

_The ion cloud is a point-defense system, _he realized. A moment later, the _Valedictum _finished aligning its main cannon, and the spinal mass accelerator thundered. The heavier rounds from the main gun joined that of the smaller broadside turrets. He thought he could see impacts within the cloud, of strange alien hull plating crumpling under the turian cruiser's fire. The Scrin ship didn't seem to have barriers, but the rounds hammering the vessel did not seem to be hindering it at all as it lumbered closer, accelerating toward his own. Nowhere near enough of his shots were getting through that ion cloud.

The Scrin vessel accelerated toward the wounded turian cruiser, and there was another flicker of movement within the cloud. Another spike lanced out of the swirling morass of gas and lightning toward the _Valedictum_.

The battered cruiser lurched, and Artanis tracked the incoming round. It's trajectory seemed off, as if not flying directly at them, and he realized it was about to overshoot him.

The instant before it passed, the turian realized why.

The round detonated just outside of the cruiser's recharging port shields, the shrapnel blasting directly toward the cruiser like a giant spaceborne directional mine. It blew apart the barriers, and the _Valedictum _slewed sideways. Shrapnel propelled by multi-kiloton force ripped through the damaged barriers like paper, and fire and atmosphere gouted out the side of the cruiser.

Artanis' boots kept him anchored to the deck, and he steadied himself on the railing of his command pedastal while the bridge's warning klaxons shrieked at him. The ship schematic showed more than seventy percent of the _Valedictum _as critically damaged. Entire compartments were shorn open and exposed to vacuum. Automated casualty reports flowed in, names scrolling past so fast he could barely read them; Artanis guessed nearly half of his crew was dead.

He went numb. The _Valedictum _was crippled and dying. His fighter squadron was getting torn apart on the display. Main gun was offline, engines almost completely disabled. Half the crew lost. His mind whirled, trying to find a way to respond, to get the ship and its crew to safety, to simply return effective fire.

Then the ion storm dissipated, and the ship inside was gone in a sudden burst of radiation and white light.

It reappeared behind them, looming over the crippled cruiser within a kilometer, and without the ion storm to cloak it, he could see the warship clearly: six hundred meters of dark, metallic crystal, spines running down its long, narrow hull. Blue-white flickers ran through the warship's hull and danced between the spines, which shifted in place, as though the cruiser was a living creature. He couldn't see any kind of weapons turrets or emplacements, beyond a tapering protrusion aligned with the vessel's spine - the main gun that had crippled his cruiser in two shots.

"GARDIAN," Artanis breathed, and the VI and his gunnery officer responded. The surviving broadside guns oriented toward the insect-like ship, and red beams erupted from the intact GARDIAN turrets. Alien hull crumpled and evaporated, tons of debris blasted off the Scrin vessel by the lethal close-ranged fire of the Valedictum.

It returned fire.

All Artanis saw on the display was a sudden surge of radiation boiling off the alien cruiser's hull, bright enough to blind his sensors. It was a river of superheated plasma, washing over the _Valedictum's _flank, vaporizing chunks of hull plating and weapons systems. A slew of smaller, hotter spikes of energy sliced back and forth across the cruiser's hull, picking off gun turrets and GARDIAN batteries not hit by the initial barrage of plasma. One by one the _Valedictum's _remaining sensors were destroyed, and the display went dark and blank.

The assault ended. Silence reigned on the bridge, beyond the warning klaxons and desperate calls from surviving crewmen over the intercoms, and Artanis stared at the empty display.

"Spirits," he breathed. He swallowed.

_They disarmed the ship, which means one thing._

"Engineering, do we have control over the reactor?"

"Direct controls cut off," the engineering over said, his voice hollow. "I'm trying to bypass damaged connections . . . okay, got it."

"Set the reactor to overload," Artanis ordered. He keyed his intercom. "Captain Artanis to all remaining crew. Prepare to repel-"

In the back of his head, he'd been trying to come up with a good, rousing speech to tell to his crew as they prepared to buy time for the reactor to overload and destroy the cruiser, but the words died on his mandibles. His body went very still, and across the bridge, the crewmen suddenly stopped in place. He thought he heard a whisper of displaced air, and an odd heat against his back for a couple of seconds.

He saw bodies twitching, hands and arms and legs moving uncertainly. The VI's voice sounded distantly in his ears.

"Alert! Multiple unidentified lifeforms have boarded. Estimate two hundred hostile boarders. Engineering breached. Life support breached. Crew decks breached. Cargo Bay One breached. Cargo Bay Two breached. Bridge breached."

His hands moved of their own accord, despite his sudden panicked efforts to stop them. Sounds akin a deep, resonant ringing and echoing wind rumbled behind him, and he heard metallic claws scraping along the deck. Below, the crewmen and officers sat up straight, hands moving over their consoles in short, quick, exaggerated movements, haptic interfaces reacting to their commands. His own fingers flew over the display before him, and with a couple of jerking taps to the holographic images, he silenced the VI. The klaxons died off, and the reports from the rest of the ship went silent.

He turned in place, feet moving awkwardly. Like a puppet's, though even as he turned Artanis' footing and movements became more controlled and precise.

His body turned all the way around, and he came face to face with a beast out of a nightmare. A massive, humpbacked ovid shape of reflective crystalline metal towered over him, standing atop four long, clawed legs. Delicate manipulator tentacles hung down beneath a cluster of gleaming blue gemstone eyes. The creature stared directly into Artanis' face.

He knew what this thing was. What had the GDI warnings called them?

_Masterminds. Mind-controlling creatures. Capable of large-scale remote control._

_**assertion - affirmative - requestsubmissioncooperation - survival**_

Artanis' blood ran cold. He'd read stories where people tried to describe what it felt like when someone intruded into their mind, but even the most lurid tale of asari neural synchronization did not match the sensation - or rather, the lack of one. There was no cold, otherworldy intrusion or raking, searing mental violation. Just . . . information. Information and thought that he did not consciously create, simply forming in his mind as if it had always been there.

He stared up at the Mastermind, unable to even control his eyes. Clicking sounds and rustling, resonating hums came from nearby, and at the edge of his vision he could see massive creatures, their bodies made up of sharp ridges and flat plates of silver, crystalline metal trundling past on sets of ten legs. Small tendrils extended from them, attaching to control consoles. Before him, the Scrin creature stood, swaying slightly, as if waiting for something.

_What do you want? _Artanis thought, trying to move his limbs. The thought wasn't entirely voluntary, being the first coherent thing he could think of as he processed the situation, but the Mastermind responded anyway.

_**organic - tiberium entity conflict - efficiencydiminished - requestingcooperation - increasedefficiency - reduceddiscomfort - offer - acceptable - cognitionenabled**_

It wanted him to surrender.

_**affirmative**_

A sudden surge of fury ran through him, tempered by a lifetime of naval service in the Hierarchy military. The stubborn, institutional resolve that had halted the krogan, that had protected Citadel space for thousands of years, and that had ground down even the military might of GDI dug in. If he could move any part of his body, he would have snarled, narrowed his eyes, or tightened his mandibles.

Turians did not break, and they did not surrender. Helam Artanis would not shame his ancestors or the spirits.

_**unfortunatedecision - selflessbutmeaningless - admirable - useless - prepare**_

For what?

_**ending**_

Then there was nothing.

* * *

"Halat, do you copy? This is Control, do you copy?"

"_Seven . . . inside the engineering subdeck!" _Gunfire, the rapid barking of a heavy pistol. _"Quintus, close that bulkhead now!"_

"Halat, respond! Control to all stations, sound an alert, rescue crew on the _Valedictum _is engaged with unknown hostiles!"

"_Get that . . . seal it now!"_

"_They're coming . . . aft!"_

"_Then blow that corridor . . . the cutting charges! Control . . . Halat, we-"_

Screams erupted across the line, followed by a slew of gunfire, and then an inhuman howling sound.

"_-rin! They can't be anything else!"_

"_Look out, the little bastards are swarm-"_

More screams, then silence.

* * *

_Now_

Jacob Taylor exhaled, releasing the biotic field around a large, brown-painted metal shipping crate on the topside cargo platform, on the arbitrary "north" side of the Embassy. A big, heavy hauler was docked, mass effect clamps holding it in place while the human hauler crew unloaded heavy shipping containers. Most of them were routine supplies being ferried into the embassy, but Jacob knew that more than a few contained weapons and armor.

"I didn't hear anything about expanding the garrison," he asked Kaidan as the mutant officer strode past. Like Jacob, his helmet was retracted, exposing his face and the crystals jutting from his skin. Kaidan was hefting a long, narrow metal container on his shoulder that a krogan would be hard-pressed to carry - probably a set of Zone armor weaponry. The Lieutenant had headed up here after they rearmed to help with the unloading, and Jacob had followed him up. Neither of them liked not having something to do.

"Eden Prime has the Directors spooked," Kaidan said, setting down the crate on the flat cargo dolly that would transport the supplies into the embassy itself. "Guess that was what prompted this. Scuttlebutt from chow is that another company is mobilizing to protect the Embassy, due in three days."

"Better used to protect our colonies, instead of the heart of the damn Citadel," Jacob grunted. They started back toward the hauler, whose automatic unloading systems were whirring. Technically the two officers and the other troops handling the unloading weren't needed, but they sped things up considerably. Over the clatter and whirs of the hauler, they could still hear the distant alarms from the alert C-Sec had dispatched earlier about a ship coming in damaged, but no one at the Embassy had ordered them to stand-to. Still, every GDI soldier in the embassy had a weapon clamped to their backs or at their sides, and someone had ordered the off-shift troops back on duty.

"Hopefully, Tali's intel will pan out and we'll now more about what Saren is up to," Kaidan said as they neared the hauler. Without even a grunt, he grabbed another long weapons crate and put it to his shoulder.

"Never get tired, do you, Kaidan?" Jacob asked, flexing his arm and generating another lifting field around a square brown crate. He walked back with Kaidan, carrying the crate behind him. "So it's 'Tali' now? Firstname basis?"

"Quarian proper names have too much punctuation," Kaidan replied with a crate-shifting shrug. "Besides, you seem to get along well enough with me and the Commander, Jacob."

"Same blood, same mud, first names," Jacob replied. "Just checking, though. Last time guy I knew who met a female quarian went head-over-heels for her. They're almost as bad as asari, you know?"

"The suits are quite . . . Artistic," Kaidan said, setting his crate down carefully on the dolly. "I wouldn't-"

White light bathed the platform, and their helmets auto-deployed. Jacob and Kaidan were both spinning toward the center of the platform, even as their ears were registering a howling, resonant thrumming and vibration running through the floor beneath their feet.

In the center of the cargo dock a swirling white vortex had erupted, and things surged out of it. They first seemed like extensions of the light, their skins glittering with crystalline reflections of the portal's illumination, but as they rushed onto the gray-black metal platform, their bodies became more substantial, reflecting the myriad lights of the Ward around them.

Clusters of dozens of quadruped creatures, bulbous bodies like tank turrets rising over the central stalk where the legs met, their heads shaped like cannons made of gray flesh and crystal. Hulking six-legged beasts with fat upper bodies and tapering heads ending with pronged energy cannons. A beast with twenty clawed legs holding aloft a body of ridged, dark crystal with a massive globe of shimmering green liquid. A swarm of four-legged, spindly creatures with heads shaped like a pair of inward-curving blades with single large emerald lights in the center that glowed a sickly green that matched the shimmering spikes jutting out of their backs. Two enormous quadrupeds looming behind them with massive upper bodies of ridged, silver diamond, a mass of tendrils beneath and blazing blue gemstones for eyes. Flitting among them, bladed threads that swarmed and boiled and spread like an insect hive gone mad.

And something else: half a dozen shapes, hunched over, bipedal, with long forearms that gleamed with cold blue circuitry and bodies covered in ridged, shimmering armor. Heads, long and snakelike, if snakes wore metal masks with jutting sapphires for eyes that glowed with an azure light, Hands made of half-meter-long blades and long-barreled cannons made of pitch-black metal that shone with white-hot light on their tips. Legs, thick and powerful, ending in bladed claws that scored rents in the metal as they ran.

A parade of alien horrors stormed out of the sudden gateway, charging into the startled GDI soldiers. They started to raise their weapons at the sudden assault, Werewolves unfolding into deployment positions.

The Scrin opened fire in a merciless torrent of plasma and lightning. Searing blue and white fury tore through kinetic barriers and armor alike, and the aliens cast the humans aside like toys as they stormed the Embassy.

* * *

_**Codex - Technology - Ion Cannon**_

_A kinetic/particle beam weapon developed by the Global Defense Initiative, the ion cannon fires streams of charged atoms at near-light speed, inflicting tremendous damage upon hardened targets. The original design of the ion cannon was based on research into Tesla coil technology during World War Two and the subsequent research into prism technology during World War Three. The enormous power of the ion cannon gives the Global Defense Initiative significant combat capability; the weapons mounted on the _Mountain_-class dreadnoughts are able to reach a yield of 45 kilotons per-shot._

_Ion cannons come in two types: direct energy and saturation. Direct energy cannons fire a coherent beam at a target, destroying the target with raw energy from high-powered ions. Saturation cannons fire a number of smaller beams at a target, generating an unstable energy reaction that generates enormous amounts of plasma and charged particles, before the primary beam fires and triggers a detonation on a scale with tactical or strategic nuclear devices. Direct energy cannons are the primary weapon used by personnel, vehicles, and warships, while saturation weapons are reserved for static, hardened targets. Saturation weapons can inflict damage in the hundreds of megatons, but are ineffective against targets in vacuum and are reserved for _Glacier_-class dreadnoughts._

_Despite their raw power, ion cannons have several disadvantages. The ions fired by the cannons diffuse quickly, in spite of the sheer amount of energy put into each shot. As a result, despite the speed of propagation, ion cannons have a far shorter effective range than mass accelerators. In addition, ion cannons are less efficient than mass accelerators and draw more power per-shot. Thermal buildup from an ion cannon shot is enormous and requires a significant cooldown period, as subsequent shots can damage or destroy the weapon. To compensate for this issue, GDI _Mountain_-class dreadnoughts mount pairs of spinal ion cannons, and _Glacier_-class ships have four spinal cannons._

_Contrary to popular belief, kinetic barriers do not stop ion cannon beams. However, the barrier does greatly diffuse the ion beam, resulting in a massive loss of coherence upon contact with the kinetic barrier. However, enough energy bleeds though the barrier to inflict significant damage; against soft targets it can inflict an incapacitating or debilitating injury, and against vehicles or ships the diffused beam can still destroy or damage subsystems or inflict mobility kills. The Citadel has developed new "cyclonic" shields that greatly diffuse the ion streams generated by such cannons, which greatly reduce the penetrative power of ion cannons. Despite this, the cyclonic barriers still allow roughly thirty percent of the total energy of an ion cannon shot through._

_Ion technology was acquired during the Shanxi War by turian soldiers, and samples were supplied to the various Citadel military organizations. Prototype designs have been developed by the Citadel species in the decades since first contact, but no field deployments have occurred yet. Rumors persist of secret Citadel strike fleets outfitted with advanced ion cannons comparable to GDI weaponry, but these have been discounted._

* * *

Author's Notes: Well that took too darned long.


	11. Chapter 11: Knife Range

_**Chapter Eleven: Knife Range**_

There were fourteen GDI troops on the top-level loading platform. Nine of them stood between the Scrin and the wide bay doors into the storage warehouse, dropping boxes and equipment and drawing weapons in surprise. Those nine humans caught the attention of a tidal wave of crystalline aliens. The furious storm of lightning and white-hot fire that surged from the Scrin warriors burned them down, melting ceramic armor and scorching the platform's surface black.

Jacob and Kaidan had the good luck to not be among those nine. They also had the fortune to be biotics, and in one case, be able to yank a half-loaded cargo dolly off the ground with one hand and fling it in front of them as an impromptu shield right as several of the Scrin whirled on them and opened fire. Two of them matched the "Disintegrator" designation: the small quadrupeds with the long, cannon-like heads, and narrow, blue-white beams erupted from their weapons and bored into the dolly, slicing into the metal of the hovering platform. The third was one of the larger quadrupeds with the green crystals sprouting from its back, which had been designated "Ravagers". It twisted its head toward them, set its blade-like feet in a wide stance, and a stream of blurring emerald spikes lanced out from a launcher mechanism in the thing's gleaming eye. They slammed into the dolly, the first couple failing to penetrate, and the rest punching through the weakened metal like it was made of paper.

Kaidan never intended the dolly to be serious cover. By the time the jagged crystals and disintegrator beams cut through it, Jacob and Kaidan were scrambling out of the line of fire, running behind a set of larger, heavier crates made of hardened ceramic and metal.

"Alenko to Embassy Command!" Kaidan shouted into his radio as they ran. "Scrin on Loading Platform A! Scrin on Platform A!"

"Up top!" Jacob shouted as they dove behind the crate. Crystal rounds slammed into it, jamming half a meter into the exterior of the container, and Jacob thanked the lunatic GDI engineers who had decided that cargo containers should be armored to the same degree as Coyote APCs.

"On it," Kaidan replied, and he leapt straight up, easily reaching high enough to grab the lip of the four-meter-tall cargo container with his free hand, and hauled himself up with a casual pull. Jacob leaned around the edge of the crate and fired a couple of bursts at the Scrin with his Werewolf rifle. The two Disintegrators skittered sideways, bounding like large, ungainly dogs, while the Ravager ignored the mass accelerator rounds that smashed into its armored skin and returned fire another barrage of jagged spikes.

Kaidan crouched on top of the crates, bringing up his submachinegun Werewolf, the lighter weapon almost comically small in his hands. He activated the grenade launcher module, fitted with standard fragmentation rounds, and got a good, ugly glimpse at the Scrin across the platform from his vantage point. Most of the wave of gleaming pseudo-insects were surging across the platform into the Embassy itself, with a small number fanning out to secure the platform. The two Masterminds who had teleported the rest onto the platform vanished in a flare of white light, probably to go get more troops.

Where the hell did they come from? He quashed that thought immediately, leveling his grenade launcher at the Ravager firing at Jacob while the Disintegrators circled around.

"Jacob, hostiles at your two, moving to flank." He raised the launcher, set the module to maximum force, and fired. The grenade did not arc; at maximum force, it impacted at comparable speeds to mass accelerator rounds, smashing into the Ravager's flank and exploding. The beast stumbled sideways from the impact, then turned its head toward Kaidan, who thrust a hand toward it and loosed a biotic thrust. The blast hit it dead center in the head, sending it stumbling backwards.

Below, Jacob tracked the two Disintegrators on his radar as they dashed around the ruined dolly, turning their cannon-heads toward him as they ran. He sighted the first one and fired a quick burst, catching it in the head and legs. The first couple of rounds bounced off the armored skin, but one round penetrated a foreleg and sent it stumbling. The second fired as he shifted aim, the beam slicing past him at chest level. He dove for the ground as the beam cut past, nearly bisecting him at the waist, and as he crashed to the platform, Jacob send a biotic pulse at the alien. Dark blue light swirled around him as he grabbed the alien in a field of null gravity, dragging it up into the air, and he fired three careful bursts into it as it flailed around. The thing twitched and jerked before going still. He dropped his aim to the first alien, which was lurching to its feet, and put two more bursts into it. The second burst sent it sprawling and still.

The Ravager let out a warbling, resonant howl and opened fire again, this time at Kaidan, who scrambled back out of the line of fire. Jacob rose to his knees, leaned around the corner, and switched to his shotgun attachment. He keyed the module to slug-based firing mode and loosed a powerful single shot at the Ravager, aiming for its legs. The dense slug, massing about a hundred times the size of the typical mass accelerator round, impacted the Ravager's leg and sent it stumbling again.

"All we're doing is pissing it off," Jacob shouted, the heat from the shot dissipating. He fired another slug, aiming higher, and saw crystal armor-plate crumple under the impact. The Ravager turned toward him, and he threw himself backward. Jagged crystals that would have easily opened up his armor screamed past only centimeters away. The Ravager then lurched to its left as Kaidan grabbed it in another biotic pull. The monster was too heavy for the field Kaidan had hastily thrown at it, and it pulled free of the altered gravity field, firing a couple of spikes at the mutant's position atop the crate.

As Kaidan dropped beneath the alien's fire, he spotted more Scrin charging across the platform: another Ravager, three more Disintegrators, and one of the humanoid creatures with the gleaming eyes, bladed fingers, and glowing arm-mounted cannons. GDI designated them "Intruders," though the only records they had of this variant of the Scrin came from Shepard's accounts and recording equipment from the massacre on Akuze.

"More hostiles inbound," Kaidan called. Jacob fired another shotgun slug below, annoying the Ravager and drawing its fire. Kaidan rose and hit it with another grenade shot. He thought he saw black and silvery fluid running from rents in its armor. Good; if it could bleed, they could kill it.

_We killed plenty of Scrin a century before we ever found mass effect technology,_ he thought with grim determination as it shot back at him. _And we can kill them now. _They could drop this creature if they kept pounding it, assuming it didn't get lucky and catch them with one of its spikes. Even a glancing hit on an infantryman from one of those jagged projectiles could be lethal, considering how they'd opened up tanks and APCs a century ago. But the reinforcements were closing in, and they had to kill it fast.

White light flared across the platform again, and Kaidan looked up. The Masterminds who'd brought the first wave were returning, and another slew of crystalline horrors were gathered around them. They surged toward the Embassy, though one of the monsters stopped, and Kaidan realized from its bulbous shape that it was another of the teleporting command units. This one had thicker legs and a smaller, flatter body. Gleaming spikes of sapphire ran along thick, ridged armor plates, crackling lightning playing among them.

He recognized it from Shepard's reports, but that just made his blood run cold.

The strange Mastermind variant turned toward him, the gemstone eyes on the front of its body glittering with a dark blue light, and every Scrin creature between Kaidan and the new arrival scrambled out of the way as lightning intensified around the spikes.

"Oh," Kaidan breathed, and spun. "Jacob, move! Incoming!"

There were maybe a dozen heavy crates surrounding them, weighing multiple tons, and every single one of them were simply _launched_ into the air. There was no telltale blue surging of dark energy that characterized biotic mass effect fields. Nor was there the lightning or white light that characterized other Scrin weapons. There was just a tremendous surge of raw kinetic _force_, throwing aside crates and corpses and a couple of unlucky Disintegrators, and it picked up and hurled Kaidan and Jacob off the side of the platform along with the heavy crates they'd been using for cover, sending them plummeting toward the Ward below.

* * *

Locke was still selecting his gear, looking over possible loadouts, when his commlink pinged. He glanced down at it, and a single text message scrolled across it.

_GDI Embassy under attack. Scrin presence on Citadel. Mobilize for action._

His heart sped up marginally faster, but that was his only reaction. He started gathering gear, while shooting a quick coded message to the rest of his team to load up. The heavy components of his combat suit and his weapons went into an enormous bag nearly as large as he was, and he slung the whole assembly onto his shoulder with barely a grunt of effort.

Scrin. He'd never fought them before. He'd killed at least one example of everything else in the galaxy; he had even destroyed a couple of geth units during a recon op in the hours after Eden Prime, which had been the same one to tip them off to the quarian presence. But the century-old boogeymen of humanity were the one foe he'd never tested himself against.

He'd get the chance soon enough.

* * *

"Once we have to data secured, I'll get a platoon over there to recover it," the human, Parker, was saying as he walked down the hallways with the ambassador, Udina. Garrus walked beside them, listening as they spoke. From what he could tell, Udina was not happy that a Citadel Spectre was within arm's reach, but since Admiral Parker had accepted his presence on details regarding military matters like this, then Udina couldn't object. Or maybe Udina was terrified of a man nicknamed "Havoc."

"A platoon might be too high profile," Garrus suggested. "We should be more discreet."

"This coming from the guy who hunts mercenaries with cargo haulers?" Parker asked with a laugh.

"I agree with Spectre Vakarian," Udina said. "We've already caused enough of a stir. We should try to keep this quiet until we have the data itself. Then we can launch the all-out attacks you two are so fond of."

"I don't want to risk tipping our enemies as to where the data is," Garrus added. "We still don't know the extent of Saren's resources on the Citadel."

"Which is why I think we need to move in force," Parker said. "Saren's already killed one small but well-equipped team moving this intel. A platoon of Marines would be a much harder-"

The building's alarm klaxons erupted, and Garrus had his assault rifle unfolded and ready almost immediately. Parker was drawing his sidearm and lifting his wrist to his mouth, while the air vents in the corridor hissed closed.

"Report," the Admiral ordered. Garrus keyed into the Embassy frequency while Udina asked the usual inane civilian things that came about while under attack: "What's happening? Who is shooting at us? I'm squishy and not wearing armor and I'm a liability, get me to safety, etc." Garrus ignored them as he listened.

"_Topside loading platform is reporting that it is under attack,"_ reported the Embassy's EVA. _"Scrin force of platoon strength with several heavy supporting units. Uploading force composition."_

The hell? Garrus immediately brought up his visor's secured commlink and connected to the Citadel's dedicated Spectre office servers. He could faintly hear gunfire overhead as the visor did its handshake with the encrypted servers.

"Scrin?" Udina said, his tone shocked. He must have listened in on his own radio. "How did they-"

"Irrelevant," Parker replied. He grabbed Udina's arm. "Sir, I need to get you to safety."

"The Director?" Garrus asked as they started down the corridor. A pair of GDI Marines came around the corner and joined them, Werewolves shouldered at move-to-contact position.

"Council chambers in the main tower," Parker said. "He's safe. We need to be more worried about the quarians."

"Shepard was with them in the medical wing," Garrus said. His visor finished linking up with the Spectre office, and he began downloading all the relevant tactical data on the Scrin that the Spectres had accumulated from GDI reports and accounts of was limited of overall value, but GDI had been very forthcoming with everything they had on the Scrin threat, especially in the hours after Eden Prime. He could at least get useful data on their tactical abilities, especially where vulnerable points were.

"Right," Parker replied, changing frequencies. "Shepard, this is Parker, you read me?"

* * *

Shepard crouched in the hallway outside the infirmary, Werewolf at the ready, assault rifle module armed and helmet deployed. She could hear Tali inside, speaking with Kal'Reegar and Doctor Michel as they put his suit back together, and she cocked her head to the side as the admiral spoke in her ear.

"Shepard, I copy, sir," she replied.

"_You got the lowdown?"_

"Scrin, sir," she replied. "They've overrun the loading platform."

She did her damned best to hide the trembling in her hands that came at that warning, and kept the quaver out of her voice at the memory of Buzzers tearing through her suit. She kept her hands busy by ejecting and reloading the grenade magazine on her Werewolf.

"_Are you with the quarians?"_

"Yes sir," she replied. "They're getting armed up."

"_Get them out of here, Commando,"_ Parker ordered. _"Everything else is secondary. We need them and that damned intel."_

"Understood, sir," she replied. "The Ambassador?"

"_We're taking care of him,"_ Parker replied. "_I'm coordinating a defense until we can get C-Sec here. Priority now is securing the VIPs and evacuating them. Nothing else matters."_

She heard movement behind her in the infirmary, and Kal'Reegar's tone was annoyed.

"-can't fight if I don't have a weapon-"

"Secured files, sir?"

"_Oh. Hold on."_ A pause. "_Hey, cool, no one's in the file rooms or the secured servers!"_

The Embassy shuddered a moment later.

"_Heh. Always wanted to do that."_ Someone said something on the other end; it sounded like Udina_. "Yeah? Triple-layered EMP, plasma, and high explosives. Do you know a better way to wipe secured data, sir?"_ More exasperation. _"Sir, all that data is backed up on secured servers back in homespace. We didn't lose anything we can't replace unless you had some weirdass hanar porn in there or-"_

"Sir, we need to focus on the _killing_," Shepard called, and Parker grunted.

"_Right, right. Get the quarians out of here. Garrus said he's headed your way now. Hostiles are still up on the top floor, going to try to organize a defense there to hold them back. Get them to the secured garage on the second level and get them out of here."_

"Yes sir," Shepard replied, and closed the link. Behind her, she could hear the quarians and Michel coming out of the infirmary. "You three ready?"

"Yeah, I'm good as can be," Kal'Reegar replied. "I'm not armed, through. Security took our weapons, though Tali doesn't need a gun to be deadly."

"I'm not sure, Kal," Tali murmured, fingers playing over her forearm and the invisible, helmet-displayed interface. "My omnitool is optimized to use ECM against geth or conventional technology. I'm not sure how well it would work on Scrin. I _think_ I can mod the minifacturing to fabricate a mono-"

"Sync your suits with mine," Shepard ordered, cutting Tali off, then detached her sidearm, holding it back behind her. Kal'Reegar took the pistol, and Shepard brought up the Embassy schematics. Good news was that the air vents had sealed, so the little bladed fuckers couldn't sneak up on them. They'd have to use the hallways like everyone else.

"Thanks, ma'am, but I think we need more firepower." He paused. "Got the schematics."

"Armory station two corridors down," she reported, highlighting it. "Enough weapons in there to arm a small colony." She glanced back to Michel. "Doctor, stay close to Kal'Reegar and keep an eye on his vitals."

"Understood, Commander," the French-accented woman replied, her voice remarkably calm despite the situation, and Shepard noted she'd grabbed a heavy medical kit and a backpack medical rig capable of immediate in-field surgery. Good thinking; she would be a liability in direct combat, but if anyone got hurt, she'd be a godsend.

"Tali" Shepard added, "stay close to me, charge up ECM grenades. Kal'Reegar, you're on rear guard. Doctor, anyone gets hurt you pull them back and patch up the holes."

They nodded, and started down the corridor. Gunfire roared overhead, and she could pick out the distinctive sounds of sonic grenades and railguns, coupled with personal ion cannons and conventional mass accelerator fire. Intermixed with the ugly, familiar whines and pulses of Scrin weaponry. As they moved, she brought up Garrus' commlink.

"Garrus, you hear me?" she asked.

"_Loud and clear. I'm moving across the second level toward the infirmary. Contact?"_

"Negative. We're rerouting to Armory Station C. Meet us there."

"_Understood,"_ Garrus replied. _"Things are going bad up above. Top floor is nearly overrun. They're moving fast."_

Shepard suppressed a shudder as she advanced. Akuze was a distant memory, but no less potent for that. Close-quarters combat in the halls and dockyards of a burning pre-fab colony against these monsters was a nightmare she didn't want to imagine, let alone repeat.

They reached an intersection, and Shepard took them to the left, the quickest way to the armory station. She didn't see anyone down this corridor; according the Embassy's internal sensors, everyone with a weapon and armor was moving upstairs to repel the attack above, while the noncombatant Embassy personnel were going down below to the garages or upper non-GDI levels of the skyscraper to evacuate. That left the second level relatively empty; she counted maybe two dozen people on this floor total.

A whining sound came down the corridor, and Shepard froze in place. She held up a hand to stop the others, then clenched a fist, heart pounding. Dark energy swirled around her.

The ceiling ten meters down blew in under a torrent of white fire and noise, and a gleaming, crystalline horror crashed down through the opening, indistinct in the sudden cloud of dust and debris, and then surged down the corridor toward her group.

Shepard shouted in fury and terror, her cry drowned out as she opened fire while the Scrin poured in through the breach.

* * *

Sergeant Vernon Mills' rifle squad had barely any warning. They had moved up from the second level to reinforce the beleaguered and overrun defenders on the top level, and were advancing up a corridor toward one of the GDI fireteams holding the passage to the topside vehicle hangar when the Embassy EVA issued them an alert. Mills threw himself to the floor, activating his railgun module, and sighted down it right as the aliens suddenly burst around an intersection.

The first of the Scrin beasts to round the corner, one of the little Disintegrator bastards, fell into his sights. He triggered his railgun, and the massive gun - making up half the mass of the entire weapon system - screamed an echoing battle cry down the corridor. The heavy hypervelocity round that erupted from the module wasn't the usual type; most hypervelocity rounds were shaped by firing computers inside the weapon on the fly to ensure accuracy and to avoid issues with friction and wind resistance between barrel and target. The railgun round was a much larger bullet the size of Mills' index finger, pre-shaped and fin-stabilized with an armor-piercing tip and a frangible core of tungsten shards. It impacted right where the Disintegrator's cannon "head" met the quadruped body.

The mess was extraordinary.

It was also a waste. Mills cursed quietly as more Scrin came barreling around the corner: several Disintegrators, a Ravager, and two of the humanoid Intruders. A cloud of Buzzers surrounded them. Any of the latter would have been a much better target for his railgun, even the Buzzers, due to the sonic shockwave.

Fortunately, the rest of the six-man rifle squad had taken up positions around and behind him, and their weapons unleashed a torrent of fire upon the rest of the Scrin force. Hypervelocity rounds punched into crystalline armor. Fragmentation grenades impacted among the closely-packed aliens, and two more railguns split the air. Mills saw several Disintegrators blown apart under the withering barrage, and Buzzers began to scatter and fall to the deck as their mind-linked swarms were shattered.

The Intruders and the Ravager were a different story. He saw one of the humanoid creatures take a railgun hit directly to the chest and stagger backward. The second railgun round hit the other Intruder in the left forearm and severed it completely, but the only reaction by the alien was to stumble to the side, glowing silvery fluid splattering from the stump. The Ravager waded through incoming fire without concern, and then retaliated.

A streak of green shot down the passage, and Mills was suddenly covered in blood, and PFC Ruleman screamed. Mills rolled sideways to the side of the corridor as two more jagged green spikes ripped past, and a second Marine's biometrics flatlined instantly. Mills fired his railgun again as it cooled, plugging the wounded Intruder in the chest. He saw the gleaming armor crack under the impact and the alien was flung off its feet, a pair of Disintegrators leaping over the body.

"Fall back!" Mills shouted as the Ravager fired two more shots. He rose to standing position and fell back a couple of steps, switching to machinegun mode, and began pouring fire into the standing Intruder. The rest of the fireteam were retreating down the corridor, firing as they moved, and taking cover at an intersection further down. The Intruder charged through Mills' rounds, armor cracking and crumpling under the weight of the incoming fire, silvery goop flying from injuries to its "flesh," and it raised its arm cannons.

A double line of searing plasma swept across the corridor, focused into two tight beams, and hammered Mills where he stood. His shields stopped the superheated gas itself forty centimeters from his armor, but the heat washed through. Ceramic plates melted and ablated off, and the sheer amount of thermal energy incinerated flesh.

For an instant, there was blinding, white pain. Just as swiftly, he was struck by a sudden, numbing chill, and dropped to the deck.

The Buzzers fell on him as he lay there, but he barely felt a thing as they carved his flesh into charred chunks of meat.

* * *

Corporal Din Galorus clung tightly to the gun controls as his partner sent the C-Sec emergency response air car screaming through the Wards, above the atmosphere sheath. Corporal Tomasis Valerian was known to be a reckless driver, but he was also a damned decent pilot, and was decorated for ending several high-speed air chases with deft effectiveness and no loss of life. Galorus worked well with the turian, operating as his tech support and gunner. Volus were not as physically adept as many of the taller and slimmer species that the galaxy seemed to spit out with far more regularity, but one didn't need long legs or arms to operate vehicle-mounted riot and assault weaponry.

"Dispatch, Unit Seven-One-Three-Nine, en route to disturbance at GDI Embassy," Galorus reported. "ETA forty-five seconds."

"_Acknowledged Seven-One-Three-Nine,"_ came the response from a male turian, his voice strained with the sudden chaos hitting the C-Sec network. _"Be advised, orders are to maintain distance and provide overwatch until Special Response units arrive."_

"Understood, Dispatch," Galorus replied. He paused to inhale from his breath unit. Unlike most species, volus didn't need to breathe constantly. Once every thirty seconds was sufficient. "Have we confirmed who is attacking them?"

"_Seven-One-Three-Nine, reports indicate unknown hostile alien life forms,"_ replied Dispatch. _"Indications are they may be Scrin. Proceed with extreme caution."_

"Spirits," hissed Valerian. "Scrin? I thought those were just-"

"You're paid to fly in a crisis, Valerian, not think," Galorus cut him off. He turned back to Dispatch. "Dispatch, discretion?"

"_Avoid contact if possible, but if necessary to protect civilian lives, you are cleared to engage."_

"Copy that, Dispatch. ETA thirty seconds."

They swept across the Ward, closing in, and on the emergency response air-car's display the volus officer could easily make out the GDI Embassy. It was easy to spot, even among the field of shimmering lights of the endless sea of skyscrapers and holograms across the Ward. After all, no matter how garish the advertisements were, they didn't match raw, blazing fire and lightning.

They were the first C-Sec unit to respond after Avina sent the station-wide alert, and thus were the first C-Sec officers to get an unimpeded view of the Scrin as they assaulted the human building. Galorus could see strange, crystalline bodies moving around on the upper loading platform, amid white-hot fires blazing here and there on the same structure. The windows of the uppermost floor were all dark, save for a continuous series of flashing blue and white lights: the exchange of gunfire from GDI soldiers and the Scrin attacking them.

"Dispatch, feeding sensor data," Galorus reported. "Multiple hostile entities on loading dock. Some form of insect. Vaguely resembles rachni, but made of some kind of crystal and metal. Numerous smaller units, having difficulty picking them out on thermals."

Most of the Scrin seemed to have entered the Embassy, though he spotted two about the size of light tanks, one guarding either end of the platform, and several smaller ones with rounded upper bodies. He wasn't sure what to make of them, though he recognized the shape of some form of alien weapon on the "heads" of the larger creatures, or machines, or whatever they were.

One level down from the loading dock, he spotted a section of the Embassy wall slide up, revealing an air car garage. Two civilian cars suddenly shot out of the garage, flying hard and fast.

They weren't fast enough, Galorus realized. One of the larger Scrin legged guns was standing on the edge of the dock, directly overlooking the garage, and the instant the cars appeared it opened fire. A blue-white bolt erupted from its cannon, intersecting the first car the moment it appeared. A flare of light from the car's power generator hid the vehicle from view for an instant, and when he could see it again, Galorus saw the car split in half a dozen pieces, debris and what might have been pieces of people tumbling from the burning remains.

"Valerian, punch it," Galorus ordered, his normally cold, synthesized voice now sharp and hot. The turian needed no encouragement, and the response car launched forward at full speed.

The second civilian car dove and tried to evade the Scrin's fire, and the first two shots from the alien walker burned close. The third hit the car in the rear, and the back half of the aircraft flew apart in a blaze of light. It began a wild tumble, and a fourth shot cleanly hit the remains and blew it apart.

Galorus made certain the response car's topside gun turret was set for high-explosive rounds, and targeted the Scrin walker was they closed in. The alien weapon turned and started firing into the garage. Cars exploded beyond, and someone inside started closing the doors again.

"Dispatch, Scrin are firing on evacuating civilians," he reported, his words harsh and angry. "We _are engaging_."

He brought up his scopes, locked on to the walker, and opened fire.

* * *

"They're in the Embassy now," Miranda reported, checking her submachinegun in the back of the armored aircar. The two men beside her and the one in the passenger seat ahead were double-checking their weapons and gear as well. They were lightly outfitted: black skin-layer armor-fabric with a second long coat of more armor-fabric over it. Light armor plates wrapped around their legs and torsos, and the rest of the team wore helmets with dark red visors.

"_As expected,"_ Kane murmured in her ear through the radio. His holographic representation hovered in the air before her, expression pensive as he studied something offscreen_. "The attack on the factory has made Saren desperate. More desperate, at any rate, considering he had his mercenaries murder a dozen quarians on the street."_

"C-Sec is responding, but I don't think they will be able to react fast enough," Miranda added, checking the feeds on her visor's display. She eschewed the helmets and armor-coats her troops wore, preferring the visibility of the wraparounds and the mobility of just the light plates and skin-layer. The wraparound crystal was not the lightweight holographic display that many people preferred, but they were plenty reliable, and much better at stopping shrapnel intent on blinding her.

Citadel Security's internal network had gone berserk within moments. Miranda watched hundreds of reports fly by on the high-priority channels alone as the aircar shot over the Wards. The lower-priority channels were being swamped, and C-Sec units were already responding, with one emergency response air-car strafing the Scrin with insane disregard for its own safety. Special Response was mobilizing in full force, and the CDF was reacting with immediate and decisive violence. She could see on the external cameras that CDF ships had begun maneuvering toward the compromised turian cruiser, their weapons hot, and she knew that they were not going to attempt a boarding action.

"This is a suicide run," she murmured, and Kane nodded.

"_Less of an issue for the Scrin than it would be for other species," _he mused. _"The cruiser was a vehicle to deliver a sacrificial strike force. As I said, Saren is desperate. I am running scenarios now to determine when he put the ship that initiated this attack in place."_

"My team is too small for a large-scale intervention at the Embassy," Miranda said, bringing things back to the immediate issues they faced. "My Dagger teams don't have the firepower to stop the Scrin." Aside from the three other agents and the driver in the armored car with her, there were two more cars with a similar number of personnel, designated "Dagger Two" and "Dagger Three." A dozen operatives, no matter how well equipped, would be slaughtered in a straight fight with the Scrin troops attacking the Embassy. Not to mention that GDI might be a bit touchy about another unexplained armed force showing up without warning to shoot up their building.

"_You're not headed for the Embassy,"_ Kane replied. His image shifted, showing a schematic of the Citadel itself. _"They are using Masterminds to phase-shift troops there, but Masterminds by themselves do not have the range to conduct a temporal phase-shift directly from the _Valedictum_ to the GDI Embassy. They appear to be working in a relay system."_

Markers appeared on the Citadel schematic: three points, one starting few kilometers from where the _Valedictum_ had been located, another halfway down the Ward, and a third close to the Embassy.

"_These are the temporal phase-shift points that I have detected,"_ he explained. _"They match the radiation patterns associated with the warping gates the Scrin used on Earth in 2047, as well as Akuze."_

"We cut the chain, we cut off Scrin reinforcements," she said, and Kane nodded. He highlighted the location closest to the _Valedictum_.

"_The majority of the enemy force is still located here. Perhaps two hundred remaining units. They have established a foothold in what appears to be a disused factory complex in the industrial section of the Ward."_ He paused, frowning. _"They planned for this for some time, it seems. Saren may have some connection to the factory. Regardless, it is not your target. I need you to eliminate the point on the chain closest to Embassy. Several Masterminds have secured each location with a small enemy force. Destroying the ones located here will delay the enemy and may buy GDI enough time to evacuate and C-Sec enough time to effect a rescue before the enemy inflict irrecoverable damage."_

Miranda frowned. They'd be throwing themselves into the teeth of superior aliens, some of whom had remote mind-control capability, and at any moment reinforcements could teleport in.

"We'll take care of it," she said with confidence. Nothing she couldn't handle.

"_Are you certain?"_ Kane asked, leaning a bit closer on the display. _"I have additional elements mobilizing. I have a Marked unit moving now, and they will be able to support you in less than twenty minutes."_

"You said it yourself," she replied. "We don't have much time. I'll take the help, but every minute we delay, the Scrin bring more troops to the Embassy. They need us to cut the chain now."

He nodded, face set in grave, stark lines, but when he spoke, he did so with confidence.

"_Good luck, then, Miranda,"_ Kane said. _"I know that I can trust in you."_

* * *

Locke stood in the back of the heavy cargo truck as it swerved through traffic. He was no longer clad in his low-profile civilian armor. He wore heavier ceramic plating and an angular helmet, not too dissimilar from the GDI infantry helmet's design. In fact, save for the dull gray color scheme and heavier plating, the armor was mostly modded GDI armor plating, with an energized armor layer and strength-enhancing exoskeleton upgrades. His heavy, boxy backpack contained the standard-issue jetpack, but it also carried a massive shield capacitor directly fed into the armor to boost its barriers well past the norm. The armor and pack added imposing mass to his already massive form.

The whole outfit was bulky and heavy, but by now, Locke was familiar with it, and he moved through the cargo compartment with ease. Half a dozen men sat in the compartment with him, wearing similar gear. Two of them wore even bulkier lift-assist exoskeletions, and carried heavy mass accelerators with large, boxy magazines of ejectable heat sinks. That design was not common in infantry arms, though vehicle weapons generated so much heat that ejectable sink magazines were becoming more commonplace. The rest of the team wore lighter slate-gray armor, three of them carrying Werewolf rifles with grenade and shotgun attachments, and the last with a dedicated marskman rifle, the long, narrow, rectangular barrel distinctive from the snub-nosed Werewolves.

"What's our target?" he asked, keyed into the quantum entanglement system in the safehouse via tightbeam transmitter on the armored truck. It was still fairly secure, though nowhere as secure as directly interfacing with the QEC itself. That was why their communication was being kept short and simple.

A set of coordinates flashed onto his helmet's display. He checked them against the Citadel's standard coordinate system, and found a trio of locations across Zakera Ward.

"What are we after?" he asked.

"_Scrin Masterminds,"_ came the short, garbled response. _"They will collapse and self-destruct immediately after death, so one must be incapacitated and taken alive for analysis."_

"Understood," Locke replied. He glanced at the feeds showing the Embassy, and the blasts of lightning and plasma screaming through the top level. "The Embassy?"

"_Irrelevant."_

He nodded. The notion of ignoring an attack on his fellow humans by an alien force did not sit well with him, but he had a job to do.

"Understood," he repeated, and glanced to his team. They nodded one by one. "It's not likely that it will stay alive long even if we bring it down alive."

"_Scan it as much as possible before it expires,"_ the voice ordered. _"Any data will help."_

"We'll get it done," Locke replied, his tone quiet but resolute. He didn't know how his superiors had learned of the pending Scrin attack. Maybe they had just ordered him on standby in case, and were jumping on an opportunity. He didn't need to ask questions. Were he operating on his own, he might have taken more liberty with his actions; he'd done as much when fighting the turians on Shanxi. But this objective was narrow, and the window was limited.

And unlike GDI, Phoenix knew what it was doing.

* * *

Jacob and Kaidan fell amidst a shower of creates and debris hurled from the rooftop, dropping toward the Ward below. The Citadel's own internal systems were set up to prevent lethal falls like this; when all gravity was artificial, it was easy to automatically adjust the gravity settings to keep fall injuries and deaths to a minimum. Even then a Citadel VI was tracking the falling objects and preparing to locally reduce gravitational pull to minimize injuries around where they would impact.

The two GDI Marines were in no danger of that particular blast of anticlimax. They both spun around as they fell, orienting their feet down toward the Ward, and fired their integrated jetpacks. Hover mode was preprogrammed into the suits' computers, automatically adjusted for the mass of the wearer, their gear, and local gravity, so both men came to a near complete halt. Jacob shifted to the side a bit to avoid a falling crate, and then they were clear.

"Back up top?" Kaidan asked over the radio, and Jacob shook his head.

"Commander was with the quarians on the second level," he replied. "That's where we need to be."

Kaidan nodded, and they poured more power to their jetpacks. They shot up the side of the building, passing glaring holographic signs until they reached the upper levels where the Embassy had requested no advertisements be mounted, and came to a halt at the second floor. Flashes of fire and fury sounded up above, and Kaidan set his expression into a grim mask as they readied their Werewolves. They stopped in front a large bay window, likely someone's office.

"Warp the glass, then we'll blast through," Jacob said, and Kaidan nodded. The "glass" was really a hardened transparent crystal that could resist anything short of anti-vehicle fire. No one wanted someone with a grudge and a sniper rifle or a high-speed car to just fly up and take out important GDI officials in a suicide strike.

The window cracked and twisted as they both set upon it with ripping, distorted gravity. Jacob slid an armor-piercing mod-cylinder into his rifle's port, ejecting the shredder module, and it took only a moment for the weapon to accept the change in ammunition. Kaidan followed suit, and a couple of seconds after initiating the warp fields, they leveled their weapons at the window and opened fire. Tungsten rounds ripped through the crystalline armor-glass, blowing powdery holes through it, and the glass twisted and cracked faster.

"Push it inside," Kaidan ordered, and they both released the warping fields and thrust their hands at the glass and released a different burst of biotic power. This gravitic alteration pulled away from them, grabbing the glass and dragging it inside the office. The window held together for another second before shattering into thousands of razor-edged pieces of hardened crystal. Chunks flew into the room and embedded in the far wall, while others scattered around the interior of the office, burying into or on top of office furniture.

The pair of biotic Marines angled their jetpacks forward and dropped into the room, careful not to step on any large chunks of sharp-edged crystal.

"Let's get back into it," Jacob growled, and Kaidan nodded. They stepped out of the office onto the second floor of the Embassy.

* * *

Admiral Nick Parker V coordinated the chaos as best he could from the second floor vehicle garage. He stood in the center of the hurricane of violence and humanity, a calm center amid the swirl of evacuating civilians, squawking Citadel agencies, screaming GDI military assets, and infuriatingly deadpan Embassy EVAs. Everyone was screaming in his ears at once, and he fought to keep the insanity under control. Civilian Embassy workers were fleeing below, but the access to the upper floors of the skyscraper were limited, forcing him to use a couple of squads of troops just to keep the evacuation in order. Now that reports were coming in of Scrin squads breaching through the upper levels to the second floor, not everyone was able to get down below to escape.

"_Third Platoon, A Company is being overwhelmed in section Top-Three-C,"_ reported one of the security EVAs. Parker grunted, hands working over the Command Omnitool and the three-dimensional command hologram it was displaying over him. The ComOm was a natural outgrowth of the old ComCom wrist units used for the last century by battlefield commanders, and it gave him a running list and display of all of his combat assets in the Embassy in extreme, constantly-updated detail.

With two quick gestures, he moved another Zone Trooper squad to reinforce the overrun units. The EVAs were reporting at least fifty Scrin units inside the Embassy now, with a few dozen more appearing about once a minute on the exterior landing platform. C-Sec emergency response and Special Response units were en route, but had no arrived yet, save for one lightly-armed air-car that was strafing the enemy on the loading platform. Whoever was in that tiny car had balls of neutronium.

Those same Scrin units on the platform had a pair of Gun Walkers, who had taken a commanding position of fire over both vehicle garages, which had only become apparent when the first round of civilians tried to flee and were shot down. Fortunately (or maybe unfortunately) Ambassador Udina hadn't been among the poor bastards that had flown into the Walker's fire.

"_Alert!"_ one of the EVAs reported. _"Lower exits are being sealed. Emergency security protocols enabled."_

"What?" Parker demanded, bringing up the lower floors. All of the exits connecting the bottom level of the Embassy were being sealed shut, civilians crowding behind them. Soldiers were trying to access the terminals nearest the doors or the door controls and reopen them.

"Who the hell ordered those sealed?" he yelled, but the answer came even as he spoke. "Belay that. EVA, lock those assholes out!"

"_Isolating hostile attack vectors,"_ the EVA replied. _"Multiple points of access. Unable to fully isolate systems from internal attack. Alien attack programs bypassing internal firewalls. Physical isolation of uncompromised network nodes complete."_

"Show me what they've compromised," Parker ordered.

The schematic on his hologram display showed red markers stretching across the Embassy. Internal sensors and door controls had been compromised. Automated defenses had been disabled. Internal comms were intact. Control over the external doors for the launch bays were still under GDI control. Most of the remaining systems were still theirs, but with the door controls locked the Scrin could go anywhere they wanted.

"Points of origin on those hackers?" he asked. Four locations on the top level were marked instantly.

"_Unable to isolate precise point of origin of alien attack vector,"_ the EVA replied. _"Likely access points noted."_

Parker brought up a plot of all of his active tactical units, and spotted one on the second floor that wasn't engaged. Actually, two individuals, close together,moving fast.

"Alenko, Taylor," he called, cutting in over their radios. "This is Parker. Respond!"

* * *

The first thing through the hole in the ceiling was straight out of her ugliest memories of Akuze. The Intruder hit the deck amid a shower of dissipating plasma and white-hot debris, whirling toward Shepard with both arm-cannons blazing and gemstone eyes shining, and charged through her first pair of bursts without slowing.

The biotic blast that took it low in the legs, however, sent the humanoid monster tumbling forward, disrupting it just long enough for her to switch to the armor-piercing shotgun module. As it leapt to its feet, tungsten flechettes drove into its face from less than five meters away, sending spiderweb lines through the plating around the eyes. Shepard put two more shotgun blasts into its head at point blank range, and the last one set a splattering cone of silver-white gore out the back of the thing's head. Over the report of her own weapon, she could hear Kal'Reegar's own pistol barking behind her, putting rounds into the alien's head right alongside her own shells.

Shepard didn't stop firing; Akuze had taught her that. The alien's head was a mess of that reflective stew that ran through their tiberium-based bodies, but it wasn't dead. It recoiled, whether in pain, disorientation, or simple surprise at the ferocity of her attack, and she hauled back with her off hand, dark energy swirling around it. Another shotgun blast to the massive beast's chest pushed it back a step, and she stabbed her off hand forward, a massive cone of biotic power rippling around her arm and translating into a tremendous blast of altered gravity that launched the decapitated Intruder down the hallway into the pair of Disintegrators that dropped through the hole. They crashed together into a heap.

Shepard switched to the grenade launcher module and fired two frags directly into the pile. The explosions sent a tremendous streak of silver blood and alien body parts flying down the hallway.

She was mostly sure it was dead, but only mostly. No assumptions when these things were involved.

"_Keeh'lah_, Shepard," Kal'reegar murmured behind her, his tone impressed. "I barely got any shots-"

He snapped the pistol up and started firing as another Intruder dropped down into the hole, landing among the pile of ruptured limbs and twitching body parts. It whipped toward them, arms flying up, and Shepard hit with another biotic blast as the arm cannons triggered. The push smashed into its chest and threw it backward as a double line of plasma blazed out of the guns and discharged into the ceiling. White-hot droplets of molten metal and ceramic poured down in twin rivers.

"Down!" she screamed, firing another grenade as the Intruder tumbled backwards. It slammed one clawed hand into the floor, the blades cutting into the ceramic tiles and halting its flight. The grenade hit as it started to stand, and blew it off its feet amid a spray of more silver slurry.

Three Disintegrators poured through the hole as she fired upon the Intruder, their clawed legs digging into the ceiling and letting them hang overhead. Kal hit one with a pair of rounds, and it twitched and dropped from the ceiling with a chittering mechanical howl. Shepard crouched and rolled sideways as the other two fired, bright blue beams slicing through the air where she'd just stood. Further back, Doctor Michel and Tali were taking cover in a doorway while Shepard and Kal traded shots with the Scrin.

Shepard came out of the roll with her Werewolf rising, and fired a grenade at the ceiling. It shot past the Disintegrators, but she hadn't been aiming for them directly. Instead, it hit the hole behind them, and the detonation sent shrapnel flying both into the aliens both overhead and in the room above. Both of the quadrupeds were blown off of their perches, and she thought she heard more resonant howls of pain from the room above.

The one Kal had shot was standing back up, and the Intruder down the hallway was clambering onto its feet, one arm shorn from its shoulder and weeping that silver blood all across the floor. It raised the other arm, the cannon glowing white-hot once more, and she shifted aim toward it and launched another grenade before it could fire. The explosion sent it tumbling down the corridor in several pieces. Gunfire beside her dropped the standing Disintegrator and finished off the last two.

Shepard checked her ammunition for the grenade launcher in the brief few moments of respite, loading a fresh magazine; a third of the previous magazine of the microgrenades had been expended, and she wished she'd had the forethought to carry sonic grenades like she had on Eden Prime.

"That all of 'em?" Kal asked, keeping his weapon trained on the gap in the ceiling.

"Better be," Shepard breathed. They spread out to opposite sides of the corridor, backing away from the hole. Her eyes flicked to the carnage in the hallway. The walls and ceiling were dripping with the bizarre silver slurry that made up the Scrin's internal organs, and most of the alien commandos had been blasted to unrecognizable hunks of metal and crystal. The floor was carpeted in body parts and shiny sludge for about thirty meters. "If only for the janitor's sake."

Nothing else came through the hole, and after a few moments she advanced, Werewolf braced in one hand and dark energy swirling around the other. She looked up into the gap above; sludge dripped down from overhead, and she saw another mangled alien corpse lying on the floor above. Nothing else was visible.

That bothered her way too much.

"Move," Shepard ordered, and the trio behind her ran past while she covered the gap. Shepard waited until they passed her before backing down the hallway after them, eyes and weapon locked onto the breach above. She kept expecting something to come through the hole after them. A wave of Buzzers, maybe, or more Intruders.

"They're _melting_," Michel whispered over the radio. Shepard muttered quietly in disgust.

"Scrin breakdown if they don't have a supply of that weird neutrino-like radiation they had in TW3," Shepard said. "Same thing happened on Akuze. They didn't build anything. They just showed up and killed, and the bodies broke down."

"Intersection's clear!" Kal called down the hallway, and she kept backing toward them, splashing through the alien sludge. Her heart pounded in her ears, and her throat felt dry.

_Come on. I know you're up there. I've been in this exact place before. Come on. Come on you tiberium bastards . . . ._

She reached the intersection with the others, and lowered her weapon.

"I'm on point," she said, turning. "Kal'Reegar, rear-"

The Ravager smashed through the gap in the ceiling up the corridor, hitting the floor and standing tall, filling the entire hallway with its massive presence. The green eye locked directly onto her, boring into Shepard where she stood.

"That's more like it!" Shepard screamed, firing a grenade and launching a biotic thrust at the Scrin warrior with equal parts terror and vindication. "Go, go!"

* * *

"First teleport waypoint ahead, ten seconds," the driver reported. Miranda nodded, readying her Werewolf submachinegun, and checked the sensor feeds again on her visor. The Scrin had set up on top of one of the Ward's many skyscrapers, with heating and cooling units that radiated waste thermals out into the air over the Ward and into the vacuum beyond the Citadel's atmospheric sheath. The Scrin were hiding among the radiating heat signatures; if it weren't for the specific calibrations Kane had made to their sensors to detect the exotic radiation the Scrin released, she wouldn't see them at all.

As it was, she counted two Masterminds, judging by their size, and several Shock Troopers and a single Ravager. Two clouds of Buzzer swarms augmented the alien security force. She sucked in a breath, heart pounding in anticipation. First contact against the Scrin; it was an apprehensive thought, but she kept the cool she'd shown Kane when he gave her the attack orders. Fear was a useful tool to temper overconfidence.

"Concentrate fire on the Masterminds," she ordered, to both Dagger One and Two and Three in the other armored cars. Numbers appeared over each contact, designating them for easier targeting. "Ignore the other units until we've neutralized them."

If they didn't hit them first and fast, odds were their assault would end with the Nod troops blasting each other's brains to charred bits.

They swept in at dangerous speeds for the fireteams. Miranda threw open the side door of the car and leaned out, switching her Werewolf to micro-rocket mode, her dark hair whipping behind her in the braid she'd pulled it back into. Aside from the standard mass accelerator module, she also carried a cutting pulse laser module for dealing with heavy armor. She shouldered the weapon - the Werewolf submachinegun was much larger than Citadel standard submachineguns, demanding a stock and foregrip - and sighted the Masterminds as the armored cars swept over. A rifle pointed over her shoulder, one of the other troopers in the car sighting for targets as well. On the other side of the vehicle, the other doors opened, and the rest of the fireteam spotted targets.

The three armored cars were outwardly indistinguishable from the regular traffic of the Citadel, but their course was more than enough to alert the Shock Troopers securing the rooftop. They shifted their attention overhead, bulbous upper bodies splitting to reveal illuminated spikes. Discs of white-hot plasma erupted and rocketed toward the oncoming Nod vehicles, and the driver swerved violently. Miranda braced herself, fighting to keep the first Mastermind locked in her scope so the smart-sight's computers could target it properly.

Her sight pinged and lit up in confirmation that the rockets had a lock, and she squeezed the trigger. The Werewolf vibrated and pressed against her shoulder as it launched the rockets from the side-mounted pods, which ignited after flying several meters and dove toward her target.

The pilot dove suddenly, and there was a flash of light and noise overhead and to her left.

"Dagger Two is down," reported the pilot, his voice the quiet and dispassionate monotone of experienced airmen. It wasn't sufficient to reflect the deaths of five soldiers and one third of her force, but getting emotional about it wouldn't help, so she bit back the spike of frustrated anger that shot through her chest and focused on the objective.

"Mastermind One is injured," reported one of Miranda's soldiers. "Two is immobilized, appears dead. One is retreating. Losing sight of it." A check of their feeds confirmed it; the second alien target was lying still, radiation markers erratic. The first one was scrambling among the thermal vents, harder to spot while the rest of the Scrin tried to shoot the Nod team down.

"Injured doesn't mean dead," Miranda replied. She grit her teeth, and let the anger burn low and cold. "Get us down and drop us on the rooftop. We're just targets up here without a clear shot at that thing."

The pilot murmured a deadpan acknowledgement, and the aircar dove into a weaving swoop toward the rooftop. The fireteam knew the maneuver, and were firing as they descended. Rockets and grenades lanced out toward the rooftop, scattering explosions and expanding clouds of thermal energy and plasma. Miranda wasn't sure if suppressing fire even worked on Scrin, but incoming fire slackened enough that the few seconds it took to reach the roof did not suddenly end with screaming, high-energy death.

She dropped off the aircar, hitting the pavement in a low crouch with weapon shouldered, and the Buzzers swarmed over one of the thermal vents to greet her. The cloud of glittering, crystal blades hummed like their namesake, swooping toward Miranda and her team with liquid speed and motion that would have been beautiful if it hadn't belonged to a swarm of murderous, self-aware razor threads.

Dark energy swirled around her, and the Buzzers were torn asunder as she ripped apart the air around them with a warping field. The first part of the Buzzer horde broke apart into a cloud of writhing, broken strands, with the rest recoiling and flying apart, their graceful swarm spreading out into a fragmented horde of creatures squealing and screaming in collective agony.

That had been a little too easy, she mused, waving her team forward. They advanced between the thermal vents by pairs, bounding and covering each other and watching for other aliens.

"_Dagger Three, on the rooftop,"_ reported the third fireteam's leader, designated Three-One. "_Advancing_." Their position appeared on her HUD, thirty meters down the rooftop and much closer to the Mastermind's last known position.

Someone screamed over the commlink, followed by a flurry of laser blasts. Scrin weaponry screamed and hissed, lightning and white fire flaring over the thermal units in the direction of Three's position.

"_Contact, Ravager, two Shocks, Buzzer swarm. Two-Three is down. Support requested."_

"One to Three, en route," Miranda replied, and signaled One-Three and One-Four to move to assist. That was why only one swarm of the little bastards had come after them: Most of the Scrin assets had gone after Dagger Three as they were landing.

"Three, go defensive, draw them in," she ordered. "I have One-Three and One-Four moving to assist. Keep their attention."

"_Yes ma'am,"_ Three-One replied, his words icy-cold.

Good. Three and half of One would keep them occupied while she and One-Two tracked down and killed the Mastermind. Classic Nod misdirection. She hadn't planned for it, but Kane appreciated her knack for improvisation.

Miranda and One-Two slid through the thermal vents, closing on their prey, ignoring the roar and whine of directed violence just two dozen meters away. Through the columns of venting heat, she could pick out the radiation signature of the wounded Mastermind.

* * *

"We have a complication," Locke reported as the armored truck circled over the rooftop.

"_Elaborate_," came the reply.

"Hostile presences on rooftop. Looks like another assault team. They are trying to destroy the Masterminds. Advise."

"_Affiliation?"_

"Brotherhood. Loyalist going by configuration," Locke said, keeping the disgust out of his voice. GDI loyalty ran deep in his blood – deep enough that he recognized when the ideals were being twisted by weak hearts and appeasers. He had little love for Kane's people.

"_Orders remain. Terminate Brotherhood element if it interferes."_

"Acknowledged," Locke replied, and cut the link. His eyes hunted over the display, analyzing the Nod team's approach and assault pattern. Most of them were tied down fighting the Ravager and its support units, while two of them had broken off to chase down and kill the wounded Mastermind.

They weren't likely to get a better opportunity.

* * *

"Take us in," he ordered the pilot, clenching the Werewolf in his off hand in cold, calm anticipation.

"_Two men down,"_ Dagger Three reported, still firing, his voice still cold and dispassionate. _"Tougher than anticipated. Ravager is light-armor equivalent."_

"Understood," Mirnda reported, vaulting over a vent pipeline. The Mastermind was less than ten meters ahead, just around a larger communications array atop a wide, rectangular rooftop module. "We're almost on-target. Keep it busy."

"_Acknowledged,"_ came the reply. The last syllable was drowned out by a flurry of gunfire.

Miranda and Dagger One-Two swept around the corner, weapons shouldered.

The Scrin creature lay on its side, body rising and falling rhythmically, as if breathing, or doing whatever it was Scrin did. It didn't look like the massive, sinister monsters that she'd seen in holograms, towering over human thralls. Lying on its side, the huge crystalline create seemed almost . . . _pathetic_. Silver slurry pooled around the creature, oozing in dribbles from rents in its flanks and a gaping hole in one side. It faced away from her, so she could not see the gemstone eyes, but the ground on the far side of the creature was lit up with dim blue illumination.

But Miranda wasn't here to give the thing her sympathy, nor was she here to take risks. Prone and wounded, the Mastermind was still a Mastermind, and she switched to her cutting laser.

Dagger One-Two exploded in a fountain of blood and composite armor, drenching Miranda and throwing her backward. The rooftop around her exploded, shrapnel flying everywhere. Her shields were the only thing that saved her from being shredded. She scrambled sideways, leaping to her feet and bringing her weapon up as something shot down to the rooftop between her and the wounded Scrin. Golden light wreathed around the figure as it hit the roof, exploding outward in a wave of force when it struck the top of the building.

The figure rose, a titan of armored plating, looming even taller than a GDI Zone Trooper. The armor was slate gray, with no markings, and while it closely resembled GDI plating, it wasn't Zone Trooper power armor, but rather a hardsuit that was fitted to a man of immense proportions and equipped with larger, heavier plating. The angular helmet was a GDI design, but sharper in some of its lines. The Werewolf was a Zone Trooper variant, but in the titan's hands, it seemed like a submachinegun.

Other figures in similarly-colored plating hit the rooftop around the Mastermind. Their gear was not standardized: some wore lighter, Marine-style hardsuits, while two of them wore thick suits with lift-assist exoskeletons and light vehicle weaponry.

_Oh hell,_ she thought. _Phoenix._

The titan pivoted toward Miranda, his movements smooth and predatory, as if he were naked instead of clad in a hulking half-ton suit. His Werewolf shot up, deploying a grenade launcher, and she threw up a biotic barrier while diving for cover.

The world exploded behind her, turning into a hurricane of noise and shrapnel.

* * *

Shepard remembered, and reconciled the conflict of memory with the lumbering thing before her. It was bigger than the ones on Akuze. Slower. Skin thicker, the "muscles" heavier and more solid. And when her grenade hit it, the shot didn't send a wake of sliver blood-slurry like she remembered. It just pushed straight through the grenade with a mild flinch.

The quarians and Michel ran around the corner as the Ravager-on-steroids opened fire, jagged crystals screaming past. Shepard dove around the corner-

Intense force smashed into her left arm, and she crashed back against the wall. Agony, white hot and terrible, ran down her arm, redoubled as she slumped from it. She looked up, and a meter-long, gleaming crystal of the strange, processed tiberium the Scrin used was buried in her left bicep, crushing armor plate and buried into the wall. Blood splattered from the wound, running down her arm.

The Ravager advanced down the hallway, and she turned her helmet back toward the hulking creature. Shepard raised her Werewolf against with her good arm.

"_Bring it!"_ she shouted. "Come on you crystal fuck!"

The Ravager closed in, and Shepard fired another grenade at another of her goddamned demons.

* * *

_**Codex – Aliens - Non-Citadel Species – Scrin (overview)**_

_The Scrin are an alien species connected to the strange, resource-rich crystal known as "tiberium." They have been encountered very rarely: once in 2047 during the Third Tiberium War, where they assaulted Earth but were eventually repelled, and again in 2177 when they assaulted the GDI colony world of Akuze shortly after tiberium was discovered on that planet. 2183 saw additional attacks by the Scrin, first on Eden Prime. In all encounters between the Scrin and organic species, whether human, Terminus, or Citadel, the Scrin have been hostile, issuing no demands or attempts to communicate and indiscriminately attacking any non-Scrin in their path. Their apparent alliance with the geth and Saren Arterius during the attack on Eden Prime, however, shows that they are not universally hostile._

_Scrin biology, insomuch as human and Citadel scientists have been able to determine, is based around tiberium. Bodies that have been studied before breakdown indicate that they are a tiberium-based lifeform, incorporating a processed form of the crystal into their bodies at the cellular and genetic-equivalent level to the same degree that carbon is incorporated into organic species. The morphology of individual Scrin beings appears to be extremely malleable, with some components of their bodies made up what appear to be mechanical structures, while others are softer, "living" tissues. Specialization and directed growth/construction are theorized to be extremely advanced within the species, with many different creatures making up the armies and support elements of Scrin society. If there is a "true" Scrin entity or body form, it has yet to be encountered or identified as such._

_Scrin forces represent a significant threat to conventional military forces due to their unconventional weaponry and technology. Energy weapons, including devices that generate intense electrical charges or masses of projected plasma, are the primary weapon of Scrin forces. These weapons are at best slowed down by kinetic barriers and at worst pass right through them. Scrin also present unusual technologies that allow them to teleport troops from point to point, seize physical and mental control over groups of organics, or initiate a "phase-shift" that freezes troops or objects in place in a manner resembling a biotic stasis field. A complete non-reliance on mass effect technology further makes the Scrin difficult to detect or counter._

_Little is known of Scrin social structure. Though highly intelligent and possessing clear, identifiable objectives in every encounter, the psychology and mindset of individual Scrin creatures and their leadership in unclear. Though individual units appear to possess analogues for organic emotions and sensations like pain, they will not hesitate to throw themselves into suicidal assaults or sacrifice themselves to protect other, more valuable units. Decoded communications from the Third Tiberium War and later encounters indicate some form of social structure, and that at least part of their culture is centered around spreading, mining, and using tiberium. Additional information indicates that there are subcultures within Scrin society, divided up by purpose and assigned numbers based on when each sect of a particular subculture was formed. Identified groups within the Scrin include "Traveler-59," which appears to carry out reconnaissance, infiltration, and subversion operations, and "Reaper-17," which carried out aggressive, brutal assaults with powerful ground forces._

_Using decoding techniques pioneered in the Third Tiberium War, GDI cryptoanalysts have been able to determine that the sect that attacked Eden Prime identified itself as "Reaper-18."_

* * *

_**Codex – Aliens – Non-Council Species – Scrin: Buzzers**_

"_Buzzers" are an ubiquitous sight among Scrin forces. Forming up into swarms and clouds, Buzzers are creatures that resemble long, thin strands of razor wire, with cutting blades and tiny claws. Their precise means of locomotion is unclear, but it is theorized that whatever technology the Scrin use for their antigravy craft is also used by these creatures. In combat, Buzzers attempt to close with their targets, and surround them, using their blades to cut through any soft points on enemy armor. Once breached, the blades will quickly and efficiently slice apart the soldier within._

_Buzzers also appear to serve as a maintenance and operations force for Scrin structural units in the field, with swarms emerging from damaged or destroyed alien facilities to attack GDI and Nod soldiers. Buzzer swarms defended the same facilities from infiltration and assault, often forcing GDI and Nod armies to simply level entire Scrin bases and occupied zones. "Hives" of Buzzers formed a perimeter defense around many Scrin facilities and operational zones, housing massive swarms of these creatures, and heavier Scrin combat "vehicles" would have Buzzers housed in their hulls, using them like mobile insect hives._

_Buzzers possess a linked consciousness. Disruption of individual Buzzers within a swarm causes a backlash across the swarm. While the deaths of individual swarm-members will not stop a group of Buzzers, the deaths of a number of the swarm will cause a severe backlash that can cause the rest of the swarm to either die of shock or be paralyzed by pain. Once this happens, the swarm loses coherence and the whole group will die off within minutes. For this reason, flame-, sonic-, gravitic-, and area-effect weaponry are recommended to quickly destroy swarms. For this reason, GDI facilities also possess atmospheric lockdown protocols to automatically seal off air vents and other passageways buzzers swarms can use to bypass defenses._

* * *

**Author's Notes: **This chapter was originally planned to cover the entire Embassy battle. But it kept growing and growing and more stuff snuck in until I realized we might as well just split it in two or maybe three parts. Yay, more violence!_  
_

One thing that developed while I was writing this chapter was Shepard's apprehension regarding the Scrin. I tried to make it clear that the Scrin goddamned well _scare the shit out of her_ but she's able to keep her cool - for the most part - while fighting them. It wasn't as apparent in the Eden Prime chapters, and later revisions of this story will reflect that change to her character. Buzzers, though...well, there's a reason Shepard got those scars...

Until next chapter . . . .


	12. Chapter 12: Dynamic Entry

_**Chapter Twelve: Dynamic Entry**_

Raw data, unfiltered and chaotic, poured across the extranet.

They tracked it, starting as disparate inputs lacking context. Input was captured, assembled, and transferred down optical pathways and mass-free corridors, transitioning at faster-than-light speeds, filtered and studied and collated at a million other nodes, before being transferred to a single point. Analysis provided definition, comparison provided context.

A human mind provided meaning.

Sources were disparate. Some were public, providing general and periodically viable snippets of input that only became useful once collated. Some were through direct observation, either active or passive, providing a variety of data with a variety of value. Some were more specific: taps on data feeds, hidden surveillance devices, camera feeds from agents in the field, and more esoteric detection mechanisms like bio-samplers, element zero detectors, and phase-shift pulse scanners.

They painted a tremendous, hideous picture of the chaos in Zakera Ward, an event that drew all of their attention at the moment. As the data poured in and they struggled to understand it, they watched closer. Smoke drifted in front of eyes that were no longer entirely human, but they only registered it in passing. They instead focused on the individuals: a Zone Trooper who was being bisected by a Scrin warrior. A C-Sec aircar, deftly evading Scrin fire while shooting down at the aliens. Civilians pounding on sealed doors. A GDI Commando pinned to a wall by a tiberium spike. A turian Spectre blasting a Scrin Intruder at point-blank with a sniper rifle. Nod soldiers, scattered and mangled on a rooftop.

Two quarians, around which all this lunacy was revolving.

They lifted a cigar to their lips, watching the insanity perpetuate itself, and formulated scenarios to find a way to bring it all back under their control. The control that was an illusion. No. No it wasn't. They were in control.

Their eyebrow twitched as they forced a reharmonization. Sometimes . . . Sometimes they disagreed. Philosophy, fortunately, was their most common point of contention. They agreed on operational issues almost universally, and what they didn't agree on they could reach a consensus and compromise within a few seconds.

Focus. Focus on the individual. On the larger scale, and how they interweave. But which should be focused on more? Neither, both are equally important. Acceptable, but inefficient. Inefficiency was the purview of organic life: requiring equal amounts of self-organization and perpetuation but coupled with other biological impulses, they could not task all resources to optimization. But there was nothing wrong with that, was there?

Focus. Reharmonization. Getting distracted. The _other_ great failing of the organic machine, but somehow exacerbated. Integration had . . . unexpected side effects.

The direct line chirped, interrupting the internal argument. A twitch showed identity, and they both focused on the commlink. Two disagreements became one consensus.

"_Locke," _reported a voice. Distantly familiar, despite close degrees of association. The incongruity was disconcerting. _"We have one secured. Creature is injured."_

"Begin analysis," they ordered, shifting all resources to the task. "Upload immediately."

"_Scanning now," _replied the commando.

Data burst into their consciousness, and they began to observe, study, collate, and theorize, while biological components moved to pour another glass of brandy.

* * *

The stairwell was drenched in glassy alien blood-analogue. There weren't a lot of dead aliens - most of them were in cover on the level above - but the Scrin that Corporal Gillian Nolan's Zone Trooper squad had killed died messily. The hulking GDI troops of Bravo Squad, Fourth Platoon, Delta Company, charged up the stairwell, alien guts and silver blood splashing on their heavy boots, and hallway barriers folded and attached to their left arms. Most GDI fireteams had been routed and fallen back, but Nolan's team, accompanied by Gamma, a Marine rifle squad from Second Platoon, had counterattacked and gunned down a group of the Scrin warriors, retaking this stairwell.

Now they rushed up into the hallway outside, Nolan holding his Werewolf one-handed while hefting the folded ceramic plates of the hallway barrier in his left arm like a medieval shield. Plasma from an Intruder's arm gun seared along the thick, rectangular barrier, and his onboard targeting computer fed the Zone Trooper a firing angle from his Werewolf's sensors. He sighted the Scrin and fired a single railgun blast, the round shearing off the Intruder's arm in a spray of glassy gore. More gunfire ripped past him and tore into the humanoid Scrin's torso, sending it stumbling backward, and Nolan took the opportunity to drop to a knee and slam the hallway barrier down with a crack of metal on ceramic.

He crouched behind the barrier, which rose to waist height when collapsed, and sent an activation signal. Nolan sighted the stumbling Intruder and fired again, the railgun bisecting the injured alien at the waist. The barrier clicked and began deploying as the alien flew apart, plates expanding up and out to fill the width of the hallway. Kinetic barriers began activating automatically, useless as they were against Scrin, and the barricade rose to the hallway's ceiling.

Within a couple of seconds Nolan had sealed off his end of the hallway, leaving only a few of small firing ports for his weapon and the Marines beside him.

"Left side sealed!" Nolan reported, pointing his weapon through the armored barrier and sighting a pair of Disintegrators as they rounded a corner. He sighted, corrected his aim with his suit's computers, and blew one in half.

"Center, sealed!" shouted a Marine.

"Right side, sealed!" shouted Sergeant Ibella. "This is Bravo Actual, we have the secondary stairwell secured!"

The Scrin reacted within seconds. The GDI force barely had enough time to take positions at the barriers' firing ports before more Disintegrators, chased by Intruders, began to bound around the corners, firing searing beams at the defenders. Sparks and molten armor erupted from the barriers, but they held, and the return fire from the GDI soldiers was withering.

"Troopers, focus on the big bastards!" shouted Ibella. "Marines, take out the little ones! Buy the evac some time!"

* * *

_Report- query?_

_Hostile - identification - verified? Identification - verification: HostileHF1 - specified designation: Shepard._

_Identification archived - priority - moderate_

_Advisory: HostileHF1 experiencedtacticalcombat: reprioritize? _

_Denied_

_Hostiles - identification - verification: HostileQF1 - archived designation: Tali'Zorah vas Neema - verification: HostileQM1 - archived designation: Kal'Reegar_

_Priority - extreme_

_Query: Survival?_

_Response: Irrelevant - prioritize HostileQF1 and HostileQM1_

* * *

Captain Ivan Dolvich had many problems. Being the GDI officer commanding the GDS Kursk, personal ship of Rear Admiral "Havoc" Parker, brought countless problems to begin with, many involving the words "strategic" and "collateral". Being captain of the Kursk in Citadel space meant those problems were compounded, even on days when two old enemies were not rearing their heads at the same time, one to attack GDI confidence, and the other to attack the GDI Embassy.

"Captain!" the comms officer called over the chaos in the bridge. "C-Sec is still refusing our requests launch!"

"Of course!" the stocky captain replied, his thick-accented tone dry and caustic. He strode across the bridge, the blue-white light glaring against his stark gray-white naval uniform. "It is not like we are fighting a mutual enemy! It would make sense to allow us to concentrate forces against mutual threats, and therefore we all must do the exact opposite."

The comms officer did not reply, instead speaking into his headset, apparently trying to convince the C-Sec officer on the other end to release them to engage the enemy. His console flashed as another message came in.

"Captain, Admiral Havoc," the comms officer called, and Dolvich nodded. He activated his omnitool, directing the line to his own personal communications system.

"Captain Dolvich, sir," he said.

"_Captain, where the hell is my air support?" _Parker called. He could hear explosions in the distance.

"You will have to ask Citadel Security for that, sir," he replied. "I have explicit orders from C-Sec to hold position and not attempt to leave my berth."

"_I wasn't aware GDI ships followed Citadel orders, Captain," _Parker replied quickly.

"The three anti-ship guns pointed at my bow when I said the same thing were quite convincing," Dolvich said, his words dry. "I am trying to persuade them to see reason, but I think they're still trying to figure out what is going on."

There was a pause.

"_Captain, upload the spoofers into your Orcas' IFFs," _Parker ordered. Dolvich frowned, then nodded.

"I do not think the Citadel would appreciate that," he said. "But I shall do so. We'll get air support headed your way, even if I cannot launch the ship."

Dolvich closed the channel and barked orders to his flight commander to begin loading the IFF protocols they'd stolen from C-Sec into the Orcas in the Kursk's launch bay. InOps would be pissed that they would play that intelligence coup so quickly, but orders were orders, and he wondered what the salarians would think when they realized the "amateur" humans had managed to break their security systems and acquire something so potentially dangerous.

He shook his head. They would deal with that later. For now, he needed to get the four Orca strike craft in his launch bay out and into the fray. He could only hope that Lieutenant Telfair's squad could make a difference.

* * *

Shepard anticipated the recoil of firing the grenade module. She didn't anticipate the _pain_. The tremor from the module rolled through her body, and that was enough to send a cascade of white-hot agony up her impaled arm, even through the painkilling medigel the suit pumped into her wound.

She tried to ignore it. Commandos _learned _to ignore it, both in training and raw experience. Jaw clenched so hard it hurt, she kept the grenade launcher raised, stock pressed to her shoulder, and fired another shot into the Ravager as it recovered from the last detonation. The first couple of grenades had barely made it flinch, but her constant, steady barrage, one every couple of seconds, at least _seemed_ to be pushing the Scrin beast back with repeated hits.

Michel was next to her, right out in the open with that classic not-giving-a-fuck attitude of combat medics. Her omnitool glowed, lighting her up even more as a target, but Shepard said nothing about the doctor's near-suicidal bravery.

"We have to cut her loose!" she shouted, opening her medical kit. Kal'Reegar slid in between the doctor and the Scrin, pistol barking, while Tali crouched beside her, her own omnitool lit up.

"Get to cover!" Shepard ordered, firing another shot. "I need-"

"We need to cut you down, ma'am," Kal'Reegar replied, still firing. His voice was as cold as liquid nitrogen. "Not leaving you behind."

"That pistol is useless against something this big!" she shouted, firing another shot for emphasis. Her mind worked furiously as she counted the number of grenades left in the magazine. She could hear the whine of a laser scalpel starting up. Tali was holding the device, while Michel's hands deftly moved through the medical kit. "Reegar, get to the armory station! Heavy weapons! Down the hall!"

The laser scalpel whined, and Reegar paused for less than a heartbeat before spinning and charging down the corridor. Shepard fired another shot, hitting the Ravager in the thing's glowing face. Heat washed over her as Tali started cutting in the space between the wall and Shepard's arm.

"No effect!" she reported after a moment. "This laser doesn't have enough power!"

Or at least, not enough power to cut through the spike before Shepard ran out of ammo.

"It's all I've got!" Michel said. "I'm not equipped with hull-cutting tools!"

"Down to half!" Shepard shouted as she fired another shot. This grenade hit the Ravager's leg, and it stumbled sideways. Dribbles of that silver goo-blood were running down small cracks in the monster's armor, but she wasn't hurting it fast enough. This Ravager wasn't like the ones on Akuze; here, the grenades were doing little more than knocking the metaphorical breath out of it. Had they been adapting to GDI weaponry?

"When I run out, get clear!" Shepard ordered. She grit her teeth as she spoke, remembering the screams. Maybe this time . . . .

"But-" Tali began, standing.

"You're more valuable!" Shepard snapped, and fired again. "I'll hold it off until-"

There was a sudden flash of light and heat, cutting her off, and more agony screamed through her.

* * *

The Scrin were pushing deeper into the Embassy. The EVAs were feeding Garrus information on where the aliens were breaching the building, with groups entering the second floor. Isolated pockets of human resistance still held the main accessways to the second level, but the aliens were simply blasting holes in the top floor and descending.

And, in spite of the Citadel's prohibitions against AI, even the shackled, emotionless EVAs, Garrus appreciated their input, reaction time, and warnings when two of the humanoid "Intruders" came bursting around the corner and directly into his line of fire outside the armor station.

He hadn't had time to study the Akuze data in detail, but he knew enough to understand that Scrin xenobiology afforded them different structures than humanoid organic life. Headshots disoriented but did not kill them.

When the Intruders came around the corner, the first one to leap into view took a high explosive round from Garrus' marksman carbine dead center in the chest.

The creature was larger than a human or a turian, more akin to a krogan in mass, but that mattered little. The high-explosive rounds were designed to knock over enormous wildlife like alpha varrens. The detonation blew apart Scrin armor and flung the Intruder into the wall.

Garrus dropped the carbine, overheating from the mass and power of the explosive round, and snapped up his assault rifle as the second Intruder rounded the corner, arms rising and plasma cannons glowing. He poured bullets into the creature's head and torso as it oriented toward him, and the armor-piercing rounds blew chunks of plating and silver blood out the back of its head. The Intruder jerked back, a strange resonating warble erupting from it, and Garrus pressed the attack. He fired single shots or two-to-three round bursts, aiming for the sapphire eyes in the thing's mangled head. He saw one explode from a direct hit, but couldn't pick out the other in the jerking alien's slurry-covered face.

Instead, he switched to concussive fire mode. The second barrel beneath the main one of his rifle pumped, launching a tiny rocket-propelled fin-stabilized round into the Intruder, which then exploded with tremendous concussive force. The cracking detonation launched the disoriented Scrin off its feet and into its companion. The first wounded Scrin was nearly on its feet when its companion slammed into it and knocked them both prone.

Garrus tossed a couple of incendiary grenades at the pile of crystalline aliens.

Part of him felt an urge to turn around and walk away without looking at the aliens when the grenades detonated, but that would be unprofessional. Instead he watched them as the plasma charges exploded and consumed the aliens where they lay. Once he was sure they were dead, he turned and entered the armory station.

The GDI private manning the station nearly shot Garrus as he strode into the room. The young, nervous human was only halfway into his armor, pointing a pistol at the turian. Naked fear was apparent on his fleshy, soft-skinned face, and the short, shaved fur on the top of his head was plastered flat with nervous sweat.

"Put that thing away," he ordered, and brought up IFF on his visor as he crossed the room. "Private Wallcroft, Spectre Vakarian," he continued, and gestured at the long, narrow room. Line after line of sealed weapons lockers covered each wall, behind the locked access door.

"I need weapons," Garrus said. "Get me inside. We have Scrin to kill."

* * *

Locke finished his report, right as a laser beam sliced along his torso plating. He whipped around, raising the grenade launcher, smart-sight hunting through the obscuring smoke and thermal waves rising from the ventilation units. The woman leading the loyalist Nod force was _fast_. Faster than an ordinary human should be, not to mention a biotic; it was the only thing that kept her alive when he'd sprayed her with micro-grenades while landing.

The rest of the team was surrounding the body of the prone Scrin, forming a perimeter while the scanners went to work. Everyone had their eyes on everyone else, and their orders were clear in case one of them began acting strange: Shoot first.

Locke had a more pressing concern, for the woman was moving out there. He could pick out her footsteps over the din of the battle between the loyalist unit on the other side of the roof and the remaining Scrin units. The faint whisper of stealth-poly boots on ceramic rooftop was hard to pin down, even with his suit's audio trackers. The sensor suite was unclear as to where she was hiding; the vents were obscuring thermals, and he was having a hard time picking out element zero masses due to what looked like one hell of an ECM system.

He turned slowly, eyes hunting as he slipped around the perimeter. His suit was reporting minor damage from the glancing hit from the laser beam, with no loss of functionality. The nano-autorepair system hadn't even activated to fix internal damage.

_Fascinating technology. Amazing that the batarians of all people managed to develop it . . . ._

He thought he saw movement, a flicker on the scanner, and strode forward, launcher raised. The contact appeared and disappeared, moving from multiple points. Definitely ECM.

"Detaching from perimeter," he warned the team. "Maintain watch in case she doubles back."

The fireteam acknowledged, and he slid forward, a silent quarter-ton of coiled destruction, and pursued the flickering contact. If she was careless, he'd run her down and finish the job, either with railgun or grenade.

But if she was deliberately trying to draw him out, she wouldn't regret that mistake for long.

* * *

Miranda paused behind one of the thermal vents, her breath steady. Some Nod soldiers had superconducting neural wiring to reroute their fear of death, but she had nerves of steel. There was fear, an awareness of just how bad things had swiftly gone, and how alone she was, despite the Brotherhood chatter on the commlink. But that fear kept her sharp, instead of overwhelming her.

She didn't know whether her nerves were a skill she'd earned or if they were just part of the package.

Miranda checked her visor. The Phoenix squad had thrown down the standard battlefield ECM, and her sensors were struggling to sort it out, but she could make out the enormous trooper with the heavy Werewolf as he prowled among the vents after her. The rest, as far as she could tell, were clustered around the Mastermind.

She _could_ bypass the big guy and hit the Mastermind now. Conventional logic would have her take advantage of her maneuverability to reengage the primary target at her discretion. But she saw how he moved, and instinct - and a bit of paranoia - warned her that the enormous soldier hunting for her was too wary to be easily evaded. She'd have to deal with him first, either evading or neutralizing him, before eliminating the Mastermind.

Time was terribly short. The next wave of Scrin could arrive at any moment. The Mastermind was down but not out, and if there was a Corrupter among the mix, the Scrin command unit would be on its feet in seconds.

Miranda slid out from cover, darting between ventilation units, and spotted the massive soldier less than twenty meters away. He pivoted toward her with speed that was definitely not natural, massive cannon pointed her way.

She fired two laser blasts; one beam cut through the rooftop a couple meters behind the man, and the second hit him in the chest, scoring a deep black furrow. She kept moving, cloaked in mid-step, and then changed direction right as he fired. Microgrenades exploded where she'd stood a moment ago before reversing direction, shrapnel skipping off her shields. She dove back behind the first unit, and slipped around the side under the cover of the detonations.

The optical-thermal camouflage she carried in the armor was useless against the Scrin, but still effective against most standard and military-grade scanners. She doubted it would defeat his sensor suite for more than a few moments, as Phoenix never gave people like this anything less than the cutting edge. It was an unfortunate reality of tech vs. tech warfare that the exploits and vulnerabilities of previous-generation equipment were ironed out with subsequent generations. Phoenix was constantly upgrading their tech with their own software and hardware; the omnitool weaponry that would have worked against current-gen Citadel, GDI, or Nod technology as recent as a month ago would barely affect Phoenix's, if it worked at all.

Fortunately, Miranda Lawson had more in her blood and flesh than just enhanced genetics.

She thought, and the superconducting weave threaded through her body's nervous system triggered complete sensor transparency.

The activation didn't appear on her visor's HUD, instead showing up inside her own retina. The suit was linked to her internal subsystems, however, and fed power from the suit core to them. Kane had not given her the technology that had assembled itself inside her body during her lifetime, but he did supply the gear that helped her take advantage of what she had.

Gliding around the corner, Miranda raised her Werewolf to her shoulder and targeted the Phoenix agent's head. He was still firing his weapon at where she had been standing a heartbeat ago, oblivious to the invisible, sensor-transparent woman, and she pulled the trigger.

* * *

The launch bay for the _GDS Kursk _was in the same state of hurried chaos as the rest of the ship. Munitions and flight crews were going over the last emergency alert checks while EVA units reported the status on the Orcas' onboard systems to the engineers and techs. It was a riot of noise: shouts and mutters, moving munitions carts, and emergency klaxons, and the only thing that she could think of as she ran through the mess, sealing her helmet, was that she'd left her service pistol in the armory's Grindstone device for software updates.

For Lieutenant Anastasia Telfair, flight commander for the Kursk's Orca strike craft compliment, the lack the reassuring weight and the equal lack of time to recover the weapon were painfully distracting, but she tried to shut it out as she ran pre-flight emergency checks from inside her helmet. Some strands of her black, blonde-streaked hair flew past her eyes, but she didn't have time to take the helmet off and tie her hair back down from the rough braid she'd pulled it into. There was no gravity in the launch bay; everyone was moving around with automated mag-boots, the gravity fields shut off the moment the alert came down.

She rounded another Orca, and spotted her craft, sitting in its launch cradle. The four Orcas were smaller than atmosphere craft, designed for escort and intercept work in vacuum, and they took up most of the space in the _Kursk's_ lowest deck. Instead of the old turbofans and long tails, they had wide, bulbous thrusters flanking the tapering fuselage, with missile pods mounted below the cockpit and two deceptively short-barreled mass accelerators in a dome gunmount on the nose. She disengaged her own mag-boots and leapt through the air toward her Orca's waiting cockpit, a flight crewman standing beside the open canopy. He caught her arm as she reached the craft, and she rotated her body, plating her boots on the side of the craft. She clambered down into the cockpit, the canopy closing down around her.

Her HUD finished syncing with the Orca's, and streams of data began to fill her helmet display. Her eyes flicked about, moving independently to go through the final flight checks. Human brains and eyes weren't wired for independent movement, but the sheer volume of data an Orca pilot took in demanded one overcome that. Anastasia had gone through months of mental conditioning and plenty of migraines while training herself to handle it, but it had been worth it to fly the strike craft.

"Artemis Lead, all systems check," she called. A trio of portraits appeared in the upper left corner of her HUD from the other pilots in the flight as they checked in. She could see her own portrait in the lower right corner, slightly larger. Like most humans, she was a mixture of many ethnic bloodlines, though she favored her Korean side more strongly, save for pale blue eyes and the blonde bits in her hair. She was tall and slender, both from her heritage and as a symptom of spending the majority of her life in space; her family had served the Initiative military since the First Tiberium War, so space service was in their blood by now.

"_Artemis Two, check."_

"_Artemis Three, check."_

"_Artemis Four, got a red on the mass accelerators, give me two."_

Anastasia nodded, bringing up her comms and checking incoming sensor feeds from the Embassy. As she did so, she double-checked the Orca's IFF codes.

"Artemis Flight, run a final check on your IFFs, match them against the _Kursk's_," she ordered, and then switched comms as she spotted the only other GDI contact in the area. She accessed the Kursk's laser transceiver and sent a burst. _"GDS Normandy_, this is Artemis Flight, transmitting identification. Be advised, will be flying with C-Sec IFF if Traffic Control does not authorize us for launch."

"Normandy_ acknowledges_," came the reply. There was a pause, and she frowned. That voice sounded familiar. _"Hey, Annie, is that you?"_

"Oh, hell," she muttered. It _was _him. "Not a good time, Jeff."

"_I know, I know," _Joker called back. _"Just . . . I didn't expect you on the _Kursk. _I thought you were more sane than to fly on a ship with Admiral Havoc_."

"Joker, _not now._"

"_Understood," _he replied, sliding back into business. _"ID confirmed. Were are still not able to launch due to C-Sec's standard issue stick-in-ass."_

"Copy that," she replied, and switched her frequency over to C-Sec. She queried the control tower. She seriously doubted she would be able to launch, but she might end up with an officer who didn't have his, her, or its head up someone's sphincter.

"Artemis Flight to Citadel Traffic Control, requesting permission to launch."

It took several seconds for a response to come in.

"_Artemis Flight, your tags read you as GDI," _came the response. Short, quick, high-pitched. Salarian. _"What are you carrying?"_

"Four Orca ASP-30s with ground-strike packages," she replied, wincing. "Guided and dumbfire. Requesting flight vector to support GDI and C-Sec assets at GDI Embassy in Zakera Ward."

"_Denied, Artemis Flight," _the salarian immediately replied.

"Citadel Traffic, request you reconsider," she said, scowling. "Both our people and yours are dying down there."

"_Your request is denied," _the salarian replied. _"Do not attempt to launch. Anything flying over the Ward without authorization will be treated as hostile." _

"Dammit, Citadel Traffic, we're on the same side here!" she hissed.

"_I am only relaying orders, Artemis Flight," _the salarian replied, and she thought she heard annoyance in his tone. Whether it was at her or his orders was unclear. _"Request for launch has been forwarded to Citadel Security Command. Standby for update."_

"The time it takes you to get authorization from your superiors, hundreds of people could die!" Anastasia snapped, frustration building up. She was notorious for her temper, and it was showing now. She didn't want to go out there with C-Sec IFFs, because the moment someone realized what was happening, it would cause even more chaos. But the troops at the embassy would need their fire support.

"We need to get out-" she continued.

"_Citadel Traffic, standby," _came another voice over the line, and she stopped. It was short, clipped, controlled, but had the flanging, metallic edge of a turian. _"Uploading authorization codes."_

"_Uh, yes. Codes received." _A half-second pause. _"Spectre? I see. Authorization accepted. Artemis Flight, we are transmitting temporary IFF codes and synchronization protocols. Please acknowledge."_

She glanced at her HUD, and found the relevant display. A progress bar filled within a couple of seconds, and the _Kursk's _EVA sent an acknowledgement.

"Codes received," she reported, and switched frequencies. "Artemis Flight, check IFF codes again. Purge previous codes." Positive acknowledgements came back. "Artemis Flight to Citadel Traffic, we are launching. Requesting vector to the Embassy."

"_Sending now," _came the salarian's reply. He sounded a lot more chipper with the bureaucracy broken in the wake of the Spectre.

She pulled up the frequency of the turian who'd sent the authorization as the Orca began to descend into the launch cradle. The dim lights of the flight bay were cut off as the cradle sealed, and her engines powered up, sending a thrumming pulse through her seat.

"Whoever you are, I owe you," she called, and a snort sounded over the other end.

"_Nihlus," _the turian replied. _"You can pay me back by killing our mutual enemy, Lieutenant."_

Anastasia Telfair grinned as the cradle opened up into vacuum and the dazzling lights of the Citadel. Flight paths appeared on her HUD, guiding her toward Zakaera Ward and the distant chaos around the Embassy.

"We can handle that, Spectre," she replied. "Artemis Flight, on me. Let's paste some Scrin."

* * *

Kaidan yanked the Intruder off its feet and pinned it against the ceiling. Jacob's shotgun module thundered three times, blowing apart the center-mass of the Scrin creature, and he fired a grenade into the gaping, silvery wound. The detonation blew the alien in half. Kaidan stepped forward into the rain slurry, Werewolf shouldered and firing at the group of Disintegrators down the passage at an intersection. His rounds tore into one, throwing more reflective sludge through the air and sending it tumbling backward, and he sidestepped into an open doorway as they returned fire.

Beams scythed down the corridor as the two humans weaved back and forth, slicing lines in the walls and floors. Jacob stepped out just enough to pump a hand at another quadruped, and yanked it toward them. Kaidan perforated it with two quick bursts. Another shot from Jacob dropped another Scrin weapon-beast in a tightly-grouped burst of tungsten flechettes. Two more bursts of gunfire from Kaidan dropped the last creature.

"Move up," Jacob called from ahead, and Kaidan bounded up the hallway past him. He spotted movement on his suit's sensors down the hall, motion and thermal contacts, and ducked into another doorway close to the intersection as another Intruder leapt around the corner, plasma erupting from its arm cannon. There was a pulse of biotic power from Jacob into the middle of the plasma stream, a pull that dragged the fire away from Kaidan and toward him, and the Zone Trooper ducked back into cover. Plasma splashed over the doorframe down the hall while Kaidan emerged and slammed his Werewolf into the Intruder's head hard enough to rock it backward a couple of steps. The mutant pulled the trigger, pouring rounds into its head and neck at point-blank range, and chunks of armor and reflective slurry erupted into the hallway behind it.

Jacob rushed up beside him, shotgun module booming, and tore apart one of the Scrin warrior's arms. They kept shooting, weapons blazing and the alien flying apart under their fire, until it toppled backward to the floor, nearly a third of its mass blasted to tatters.

"How far to the intrusion point?" Jacob asked as they moved to the intersection, checking the corners.

"Fifteen meters," Kaidan answered, glancing at his HUD. "We'll have to go through the floor."

"One more hole in this place isn't going to be a problem," Jacob grunted, and they began moving down the passage to the marker the Admiral had given them. "I don't have demo charges. We'll have to warp the floor plates."

"EVA says more Scrin are closing in," Kaidan said as they advanced.

"Roger that," Jacob said, unperturbed. He checked his EVA data feed, and scowled. Scrin contacts on the upper floor were moving in around the points marked as enemy cyber-intrusion nodes. "How long do-"

He spotted the contacts a heartbeat before they attacked. Jacob shouted a warning, then spun and snapped up his Werewolf as the ceiling behind them blew in in a torrent of white-hot fire. A swarm of Buzzers and several Disintegrators dropped through the hole, the latter firing as they hit the floor.

* * *

Corporal Nolan's railgun module howled at him as it overheated, and he vented the heat sink while switching to machinegun mode. He snarled a curse, shifting targets, and began pouring fire into the Intruder he'd just wounded with a dead-center hit from the overheating weapon. The rapid-fire module began heating up faster than normal as vented waste heat from the railgun washed over it.

The Intruder shuddered and stumbled backward as two dozen hypervelocity rounds tore into it. It fell to its knees, and he walked bursts over its neck and head, eventually decapitating the alien, but it pushed up to it feet and leapt backward through a door, trailing a river of reflective blood. Other Scrin filled the hallway: a trio of Disintegrators, another unwounded Intruder, and several clouds of Buzzers. The latter were reeling, unable to advance into the wall of fire Nolan and the two Marines with him were pouring down the hallway. The former, however, kept advancing down the hallway with intelligent but relentless determination, bounding from door to door and cover to cover, but heedless of their losses.

"The hell are these things made of?" shouted the Marine beside Nolan. A heartbeat later, a looming shape leapt around the corner down the passage, green crystals shimmering on its back in the strobing illumination of tracer fire.

"Ravager!" Nolan shouted, switching to his ion cannon attachment. The Scrin fired before the second syllable escaped his lips, and the crystal spike slammed through the barrier centimeters over Nolan's right shoulder. The ion cannon unfolded as a second spike smashed all the way through the barrier directly overhead.

The third hit one of the Marines in the chest, partially punching through the wall and burying into the man's heart. He jerked once in shock and slumped, killed near-instantly.

Nolan grit his teeth as the ion module fully charged, and he targeted the Ravager. He blocked out the other Marine's call for a medic, and squeezed the trigger. The blue beam erupted and sliced through the Ravager's torso, sending white-hot shards of crystal-chitin plating flying. The alien toppled backward, smoke rising from its body, and it struggled to its feet.

He swallowed, switching back to his railgun, and desperately sighted the impossibly tough alien as it struggled back around, preparing to fire again. He put another railgun round down the hallway, directly into the massive, smoking wound in its torso, and the Ravager toppled backward again. It started to rise anew.

There was no way they could hold this position. Not against something this powerful, which could just eat ion cannon beams without going all the way down.

But they had to try.

* * *

_Report: Embassy - Grid - 1 - 45 - 41_

_Resistance: strong - query: reinforcement?_

_Acknowledged - reinforcement - Subunit 22 - Subunit 71 - Primeunit 4_

_Advisory: probablespecialistGDIsubunit s - targetedeleiminationassimila tors - query: prioritizedefense?_

_Denied_

_Advisory: Grid - 1 - 45 -41 - reinforcementinadequate - unabletoaccesslowerlevels_

_Advisory: Primeunit 9: confirmed presence of Hostile HF1 - HostileQF1 - Hostile QM1. Primeingressthrough Grid - 1 - 45 - 41 blocked._

_Acknowledged_

_Commandunit 1 prioritized: Grid - 1 - 45 - 41_

* * *

The beam hit Locke's helmet dead on.

The helmet's armor plating was made up of a dozen composite layers, and at the yield of the laser the woman was firing at him, the beam took approximately half a second to cut through all of them to reach the vulnerable flesh underneath.

About halfway through that process, Locke had yanked his head out of the path of the beam, sidestepped with speed that left him as little more than a blur, and began returning fire. Smoke wafted from the vaporized armor layers, and burning heat seared the side of his face, but he blocked out that agony and targeted the Nod agent, his grenade launcher pounding out high explosive rounds at the fuzzy shape on his HUD.

She ducked back behind the thermal vent before the first grenade exploded - unsurprising. She was as fast as Locke, but the woman was far lighter. Less issue with momentum and inertia. She burst around the other side of the vent, and he caught a flare of dark blue wreathing her arm. He shifted aim, not bothering to evade the biotic pulse, and returned fire. She ducked back behind cover, and the twisting morass of dark blue crashed into his shields. The kinetic barriers reacted, shunting and disrupting the mass effect field with one of its own, and nullified the biotic attack at the expense of some of the barrier's charge.

He grinned beneath his helmet. Older shields couldn't do that, but those clever salarians had developed shields that could counteract biotics. In a year everyone would have them and the biotics of the galaxy would be looking for ways around them, but for now he had a nasty surprise on hand.

Locke capitalized on the surprise, and bolted forward, switching from sensors to visual scanning. He vaulted over the top of the thermal vent with a single bounding leap. He caught sight of her below - hard to see but moving fast, under an optical cloak. He raised his launcher while descending.

His suit's scanners picked up faint pulses from the far side of the vent as he landed. Infrared, from small discs.

Mines. Likely flash-fabricated by her omnitool.

_Clever bi-_

The concussive wave from the mines bowled him over. Smaller, lighter individuals would have been launched a few meters, but Locke was too massive, and just fell to his knees. He jumped back up in a heartbeat, ignoring the nausea from the blast, and brought his weapon up. He caught the faintest flicker as the Nod woman moved at the edge of his vision.

He whipped toward her right as an EW mine exploded, sending a tide of junk data over his HUD. Static blinded him, and every alert in his suit - power, heat, medigel, nanorepair, sensors, shields - sent him fake warnings.

Instinct took over, and his rifle rose. He could see or hear her, but he'd spotted the flicker, and he guessed.

He pulled the trigger twice, and bolted after her as his suit began auto-purging the junk data.

* * *

Two micro-grenades hit Miranda dead in the back.

Her shields absorbed the first one. Her armor blunted the majority of the second, but pain stabbed through her back as some of the kinetic force bled through. She stumbled and dove sideways, more grenades flying past, and got the air conditioning unit between herself and the massive Phoenix agent.

Miranda exhaled, shaking off her surprise at how _fast_ he was. Fast and accurate, and armed with a shield that could disrupt biotics. The Brotherhood had acquired a copy of it, but she hadn't expected a phoenix agent to be carrying one as well.

And going by her sensors, that impossibly fast and accurate Phoenix agent was charging after her. She narrowed her eyes, relaxed, and clenched her fists as he rounded the corner, massive assault gun raised.

With a desperate burst of biotic power, she broke physics, pulling the man into a field of negative gravity, and he was yanked off his feet.

The Phoenix agent, after all, couldn't have known that he was charging with his shields down, with his systems screaming that there were errors in every component of the hardsuit. His momentum carried him past her and into the air, and when he tried to skid to a stop he was instead sent tumbling through the air to crash into another heating vent. The biotic field gave a moment later, and he dropped to the floor in a crash of ceramic and metal.

Miranda broke off and ran before the field had collapsed. She didn't expect the field to last long; she lacked the raw power of Series Two or the recharging speeds of Series Three and Four biotics. But those were the limitations of artificially-created element zero nodes in a young adult's body, especially when element zero was not well-understood by humans.

She had only moments before he recovered and resumed the pursuit, but she didn't have much time. The real enemy would-

There was a spike of radiation from section of the roof where the Mastermind was laying, and her heart jumped into her chest.

A moment later, twenty Scrin warriors had teleported onto the rooftop within a dozen meters of the Phoenix team.

* * *

Shepard grunted as the pain shot through her, and kept the grenade launcher on-target. Through her peripheral vision she saw Tali raise her arm, and the quarian barked something that didn't translate. Shepard fired another shot as the Ravager took a step forward, knocking it backward off its feet, and she spared a glance at Tali.

Her right arm was wreathed in the harsh orange light of her omnitool. Extending from that light was a long, flat, rectangular blade, which looked to be made of burning yellow-white light. A blade, flash-fabricated from her omnitool.

"It's not working!" Tali shouted, and chopped down with the blade again, hitting the tiberium stake. More pain shot through Shepard's arm, but she anticipated it this time, and it wasn't as disorienting. She sighted and fired again, hitting the Ravager as it started to rise.

"This thing should cut through Zone armor," Tali growled, and put one arm on Shepard's shoulder to steady her, then put the blade against the spike. She began sawing back and forth. That hurt even worse, but Shepard snarled, clenched her jaw, and kept her aim steady.

"Just cut it!" Shepard managed. "Cut it or run!" She heard something crack, and Tali cursed again.

"Need to make it sturdier," she muttered. "Monomolecular _bosh'tet_ . . . ."

Shepard fired again, and checked her ammo. Running low. She turned her eyes back to the Ravager, and saw the silver slurry pooling around it, running from multiple wounds. She lined up a shot on one particularly bloody rent on its head, just above the sapphire eye, and fired. The microgrenade impacted and a spray of reflective goo erupted. The thing shambled sideways, but then took a step forward, movements drunken but determined.

Shepard heard the blade hiss into existence again behind her, but ignored it. Instead, she steadied the Werewolf as best she could, sighting the broken chunk of the monster's hide. She fired another shot. Dammit, too high; it shot over the thing's head and struck one of the spikes growing out of its back. The explosion shook the Ravager but didn't stop it. She aimed again, wishing that the module had a self-adjusting smart-sight that could guide the grenades in.

"Wishes, wishes," she muttered, and fired. Pain screamed down her arm as Tali cut again. This time, the spike shook a bit as the quarian cut into it. The Ravager jerked and stumbled, the grenade blasting a chunk out one of its forelegs.

"Come on!" Shepard shouted in sudden, desperate elation. The Werewolf pumped another shot. Silver paste blasted over the walls.

"Is that it? That all you've got?" Another grenade. Head armor cracked and flew apart.

"Son of a bitch! Die!" She fired again. Then again. Then _again._

The Ravager dropped to its stomach, the metallic fluids pouring from its impossibly durable body. It started to rise, and Shepard shot it again. This grenade went through the gap in its head plating, and a fountain of reflective gore burst down the corridor, coating the walls and flying fast enough to trigger Shepard and Tali's shields. It splattered off their barriers, pooling around them, and the Ravager slumped to the floor, a decapitated mess.

Shepard ejected the grenade magazine, lowering the weapon, and stared for a moment.

"_Keelah_, Shepard," Tali whispered, echoing Kal'Reegar's statement from before.

"Yeah," she replied, unable to get anything else out. Her heart was trying its best to pound its way up into her throat, after all. After a moment, she hooked the launcher under her arm and began fishing out another grenade magazine. She slid it into the Werewolf while Tali kept cutting.

"That was," Shepard said, pausing and sucking in air from the helmet's rebreather. "Omniblade? Never seen one like that before."

"I usually use a knife," Tali replied, sawing. Doctor Michel, who had taken cover around the intersection, moved up to assist, using the laser scalpel. "But I figured this would be-" The monomolecular blade broke again. "Dammit. Monoblades are already unstable. Worse when you're modding an omnitool in combat."

"You modded the omnitool to make a monomolecular heat blade on the fly?" Shepard asked, and Tali nodded. Another blade formed around her wrist.

"Nothing fancy," she said. "Plasma sheath on a monomolecular plane, suspended in mass effect fields generated by the suit's barrier-generator and adherence boots."

"Tali," Shepard breathed, shaking her head. "Do you have any idea how hard it is to do something like that while in combat?"

"Somewhat," she replied. Shepard could hear her trying to downplay it. The wonders of autotranslation software, able to pick up on subtle cues like that and pitch the translated words to make inflection clear. "Give me a minute here and we should be able to cut it off. We're making some headway. I don't know what the Scrin do to these spikes to make them so damned durable."

"We'll need to cauterize that wound the moment we get the spike extracted," Michel said. "Blood loss will kill her if we remove it too quickly."

"Yay," Shepard breathed, unable to put even a token amount of forced cheer into it.

"I can prep a plasma torch," Tali said. "This wound is large enough that we'll need a lot of heat very quickly."

"Okay, then," Michel said. "Get her off the wall, and we'll extract when we get to a safe location. The armory station?"

"Good idea," Shepard agreed. "Kal'Reegar should be back any minute anyway with heavy weapons."

That was when the Corrupter poured through the hole down the hallway.

"Oh _what the fuck_."

* * *

_Advisory: Primeunit 9 - engaged: HostileHF1 - HostileQF1 - HostileQM1 -HostileHF2(unidentified)_

_Engagement - projection: positive_

* * *

Jacob narrowed his eyes in concentration as the floor plates twisted and buckled, He heard a warbling call of alarm from above, through the rents in the ceiling as the warping field he and Kaidan were maintaining tore apart the intervening floor.

"They're calling for help," he muttered, and Kaidan nodded. Scrin crystal-blood dripped off the mutant's armor, but he paid it no mind, staring down the hallway. The Scrin had stopped sending troops after the first half-dozen Disintegrators had been killed trying to come through the hole. Either they were depleted and waiting for reinforcements, or were waiting upstairs in ambush.

"We don't have much time," Kaidan said, looking up. "We're going in now."

Jacob nodded and released the field, leveling his shifter. Kaidan backed into the room and looked up at the twisted floor ceiling.

"You think we've broken it enough?" he asked, and the mutant shrugged.

Then he clenched his left fist, hauled back, and launched a mighty uppercut into the ceiling.

The weakened floor blasted upward, and Jacob jetted straight up into the hole Kaidan had punched, Werewolf ready. The space above was a rec room with some terminals and computer consoles, which was where the Scrin had stationed their hacker.

Well, "hacker" wasn't exactly right; it was an Assimilator, the Scrin equivalent to a technical specialist or engineer. The multi-limbed creature dominating the room wasn't a hacker in the traditional sense, anymore than the thousands of hair-thin crystalline threads that connected it to several of the terminals were conventional network connections. It vaguely resembled a Mastermind, walking on eight legs of jagged crystal, with a tall central body of angular, sapphire blue gemstone-like tiberium. The legs met at a central body, and atop that body was an elongated head with two prongs that extended to sharp speartip points. The tendrils connecting the creature to the terminals extended from the upper body, glittering in the emergency lighting.

He thought it was kind of beautiful, in a bizarre, otherworldly way. Then Jacob shot it in the face, or closest analogue.

The creature blew apart, spraying that disgusting silver slop everywhere and screeching in a ear-hurting howl, and he winced at the noise. He fired two more shotgun blasts into the thrashing creature, and it went still.

"That one went down a lot easier than the rest of these bugs," Jacob said, and dropped back down through the hole.

"Command, this is Alenko," Kaidan called over the radio. "Scrin hacking platform disabled."

"_Negative, Alenko," _Havoc called back over the radio, and he frowned. They stepped back out into the hallway and began bounding down it away from the hole in the passage. _"EVA's still tracing intrusions across multiple points in the Embassy. They've got more than one of those things trying to take over our systems."_

"Knew it wouldn't be that easy," Jacob grunted. "Command, feed us the rest, we'll take them out."

"_Uploading now. Good luck."_

The new targets appeared on their HUDs' maps, and they hurried down the hallway to the next Assimilator.

* * *

Valerian sent the response car into a sharp dive, evading the beam from the enemy Gun Walker by centimeters. Galorus swung the turret on the C-Sec vehicle around to keep it trained on the Scrin walker. The sensor suite on the aircar was having a hard time tracking the alien due to interference and the lack of detectable emissions from the monster.

Galorus kept the sights centered on the walker, and the cannon pounded out two long bursts before valerian juked and began ascending. Return fire was cutting close, and two lengthy scars marked the aircar where it had taken hits. One lucky shot would end them both.

But the Gun Walker wasn't shooting the civilians fleeing the Embassy, nor was it firing on the C-Sec Special Response airtrucks swooping toward the landing platform, or at any of the other response cars or the quartet of approaching friendly contacts marked with GDI tags. That was all that mattered.

"I'm not seeing any serious damage to that bastard!" Valerian reported.

"Let me worry about the bugs," Galorus hissed. He inhaled. His heart was beating faster; he was drawing breath every few seconds now. "You focus on keeping-" Inhale. "-us alive."

Truth was, through the righteous anger pounding on his flesh, Galorus could tell that they weren't have much effect on the Scrin beyond keeping their attention locked on their little aircar. The Gun Walker was weeping silver fluid from multiple holes they'd punched in the armor on its bulbous form, and those wounds would have dropped a creature of similar size, but it kept stubbornly standing.

_Humans defeated these things when they didn't even have mass effect technology!_ he reminded himself, sending another explosive burst into the Scrin weapon. It flinched as the explosive rounds blew chunks out of its armor and sent more reflective slurry flying, but then leveled its gun-head at them and fired another burst of its own, forcing Valerian to weave and evade. Blue-white bolts screamed past them, another cutting along the backside of the car.

Galorus reacquired his target, and fired again, but he wondered at that last thought. Had the humans fought a serious Scrin force? They claimed to have, but looking at this impossibly tough monster who they were barely able to stay alive against, he doubted that.

Another bolt hit them, this time squarely on the rear of the armored car, and the vehicle jerked wildly, a deafening explosion sounding behind them. Alarms screamed at them as Valerian shouted and fought to keep the aircar under control, the vehicle slowing as it lost power.

_Well, we're finally dead,_ Galorus realized, and sighted the walker as his pilot righted the vehicle. He switched to full auto and held down the trigger, not worried about overheating. He stared into the Scrin's gun-head as the turret banged out a stream of explosive rounds, hammering the alien and forcing it back. It braced itself, weathering the explosive blasts skipping off or blasting into its body, and targeted them.

He saw the bolt form in the barrel of the gun-head, and was amazed at how calm he felt as he stared at death.

Two dozen rockets hit the Gun Walker right as it fired, and his heart leapt into his chest.

_We won, _was the last thing he thought before the bolt blew his aircar in half.

* * *

Lieutenant Telfair raked the Gun Walker with mass accelerator and rocket fire, pounding the Scrin to paste alongside Artemis Two. She clenched her teeth in impotent rage, the remains of the ballsiest C-Sec officers she'd ever seen tumbling to the Wards below.

_I'm going to find out who those people were,_ she promised. _Goddamned heroes._

The Orcas of Artemis flight swept over the outside of the Embassy, blasting any Scrin they could see. Within seconds, they had cleared the landing platform, leaving only charred and shattered crystalline corpses as the only indication the Scrin had ever held that point.

"Citadel Dispatch, Artemis One," she reported. "You're clear!"

The C-Sec trucks dove in, and dozens of heavily-armed Special Response troops in black and blue armor stormed out: turian, salarian, asari, and a couple human. They fired at targets hidden inside the loading bay connected to the platform, and began a bounding advance into the Embassy.

Citadel rescuing GDI. She never thought she'd see that.

_We're on the same side, dammit,_ she thought, and shook her head.

"Artemis Flight," she called, "Stay on a swivel. These Scrin fuck-heads don't play by conventional rules. Be ready for anything."

* * *

The Corrupter make the Ravager look like a hobbit. Where the Ravager was a quadruped with thin, hard plates sheathing its body, the Corrupter was the size of a Coyote fighting vehicle, covered in thick, ridged crystal-metal plates, with a dozen bladed legs. A massive, transparent sphere made up nearly a third of its body, filled with a green-black liquid tiberium that could melt tank armor. The thin, tapering head turned toward them, and an opening split the head in half laterally, somewhere between a mechanical hinge and a snake's jaw.

Surging around its body were dozens of glittering, silvery threads.

Shepard saw them, screamed, and fired three grenades into the Corrupter's mouth.

The Corrupter jerked a few meters backward down the hallway, its legs rattling and scraping on the blood-slick floor. Scrin blood-goo dribbled from the thing's mouth, but stopped within a few moments as a sickly green glow filled the creature's mouth and dribbled to the floor, burning through ceramic plates like acid. The processed tiberium repaired the wound, and the mouth snapped shut.

Shepard kept screaming and firing at the

_it was inside her suit, cutting her stomach, her chest, slicing up along her neck, her face, into her_ nose

Tali and Michel recoiled at the violence of her reaction, the grenade launcher pounding shot after shot as fast as it could cycle new rounds into the tube.

"No! she shouted. "No! Die! Get out! Die, you _fuckers_! _Get OUT!_"

"Shepard!" Tali shouted, and started slashing away at the spike with frantic determination. Down the hallway, the Corrupter was bulling forward, head down, green acid-tiberium leaking from its mouth and the Buzzers taking cover behind its bulk.

_Marines melting. Zone Troopers screaming as the Buzzers cut through them. Civilians burned down to the bone and beyond. Graveyards of buildings and tanks and crashing aircraft. A titan loomed overhead atop three legs, serpentine appendages twisting about and spitting white beams of death from behind a shimmering cocoon._

The impact of Tali's omniblade sent another wave of pain through Shepard, a white-hot flash that burned through the sudden memory of _that thing in her nose_. Shepard kept firing, but looked up at Tali.

"Run!" she shouted. "Tali, Michel, go!"

"I can cut it!" Tali replied. The Corrupter pressed closer, waiting for Shepard's ammunition to run out. The moment she did, it would release the Buzzers then open its mouth and empty that tank on its back. The clattering of its blade-legs was sharp and close over the detonations that rocked its body. Droplets of metallic blood trailed it.

"Get out of here!" Shepard screamed, the grenade launcher fighting to drown out her words. "You can survive! _Someone _can survive this time!"

"No! I'm not leaving you!" Tali shouted back, smashing the omniblade on the spike. The blade shattered again, and Shepard gasped in pain.

"You're too important!" Shepard snarled. "I'm not losing anyone else to these things! Go!"

"Not without you!" Tali shouted, another omniblade forming. Stupid goddamned quarian-

There was another blast of searing pain as she tried to cut the spike again, and somewhere between the start of that burst of agony and the end of it, Shepard understood. The frantic rush to get her to safety, and the earlier drive to rescue Kal'Reegar despite the insane odds. Shepard hadn't seen the bodies, and hadn't made the emotional connection. How many friends had Tali lost just hours ago?

She wouldn't leave.

The grenade launcher ran empty.

The Corrupter paused, waiting for another shot, and Shepard looked up at Tali.

"Leave me!" Shepard shouted, and the Corrupter opened its mouth. Tali's response was to create another blade. Shepard dropped the grenade launcher, dark energy swirling around her, and she raised her hand to throw Tali back.

The blade flashed down, and this time her arm was sheathed in numbing ice instead of blazing heat. She hit the floor, and heard something sizzling. Someone grabbed Shepard and bodily hurled her out of the intersection. She crashed and scraped along the floor, armor plates grating against ceramic, and rolled onto her left side.

She blacked out from the sheer, blazing torment that tore through her. Her eyes opened a moment later, and she screamed. Someone was pulling her onto her feet, dragging he rby the left arm, and on her HUD she could see Tali close by. Shepard twisted toward her, and spotted the quarian leaping out of the intersection, flicking the omniblade away.

Beyond her, still pinned to the wall, was Shepard's severed arm.

The Corrupter loosed a torrent of green fluid that filled the corridor behind Tali, searing and melting plating and armor and flesh. Tali rolled across the floor, evading the corrosive stream by centimeters, and bolted to her feet.

Michel hauled Shepard back, until she could get her feet underneath her. The Commando's mind whirled as she tried to process everything. The Werewolf had been in the hallway with her arm, destroyed by the Corrupter, leaving her with only her biotics. The Scrin beast-machine was chittering down the hallway after them, and she knew the Buzzers would be surging ahead of it.

Sure enough, the razor-threads swarmed around the corner and dove toward the trio.

Shepard snarled, terrified hate surging through her, and pumped her right arm at the evil little bastards. Dark energy twisted into a distorted wave of warping gravity fields that shredded the creatures as they advanced. A dozen and more of the threads died immediately, and the rest of the swarm recoiled and broke apart, dying in seconds.

"Go!" she shouted through a throat ragged from screaming so much. She turned, and they started to run.

"The armory," she gasped, her steps unbalanced, and it took her a moment to remember _wait Tali cut off my arm_. And in the process saved Shepard's life, at least for a few precious moments. The blade's heated edge had cauterized the wound, so no blood loss, which was a grim positive. The wound was still cold, but the pain was fading, thanks to the medigel dispensers working furiously to keep her conscious despite the abrupt dismemberment.

The Corrupter clattered around the corner, pointed head hunting back and forth with gleaming eyes, and it opened its hinge-mouth as it spotted them. There was no cover, and it would take precious seconds to open any of the doors on the hallway. Shepard clenched her fist and spun around to fire off another biotic thrust.

Then Kal'Reegar came around the corner opposite the Scrin, having gained half his bodyweight in gun.

* * *

Had Shepard known more about quarians, she wouldn't have been surprised. Every quarian clan was known for one specialty or another; there was a reason why quarians tracked not only ship name but also clan affiliation. Just as being born and raised on a ramshackle fleet taught every quarian how to be an engineer by necessity, every clan had its quirks or circumstances that led to their children being specialized. The 'Zorahs were renowned leaders due to having occupied positions of power. The 'Hobans were amazing pilots because they flew many tramp freighters and fighters. The 'Koris were shrewd politicians because they lived on large, compartmentalized ships.

The 'Reegars were Migrant Fleet Marines, descendants of the Rannoch surface garrisons that had survived to the end of the war with the geth. They made a point to rarely add a ship name once they had completed their Pilgrimage, simply because they believed that they belonged to the whole fleet, and served with distinction in that regard. The 'Reegars had a history of heroic last stands, glorious sacrifices, and insurmountable bravery; when a line needed to be held, a defense gun needed to be manned, or someone needed to take point to carve through the enemy lines, it was most often a 'Reegar who both volunteered and either succeeded or died trying. Thus, it was no surprise that Kal'Reegar had not simply chosen a weapon, but the biggest, meanest one in the armory with which to make his stand:

A MAWS.

The Multibarreled Antiarmor Weapons System was designed to give Zone Trooper firepower to a Marine's lighter armor. It was a half-meter shorter than a Zone Trooper's dedicated railgun, but still demanded an armature that wrapped around 'Reegar's waist and shoulders to help him heft the tremendous weapon. A snap-on strength-assist and recoil-compensating exoskeleton modification had bulked out the size of 'Reegar's suit, letting him handle the immense recoil of the weapon's four railguns.

Kal'Reegar set the MAWS to sequential fire, and advanced with ponderous steps, one arm hefting the massive weapon, the other carrying a case of shapeshifter weapons. He tossed them down, gripped the MAWS with both hands - one on the rifle-style trigger, the other on the side handle to help keep the monster steady - and spoke.

"Pardon, ma'am," he said, pushing gently past them, and opened fire.

Railguns were often described as splitting the air. The MAWS cleaved said air in twain. The floor shuddered with every shot, the four barrels firing in alternating sequence. A continuous stream of heavy hypervelocity slugs thundered down the hallway into the Corrupter's head and body. It jerked and fell back, blood spraying as armor-piercing rounds punched deep into its body.

"Brace me!" Reegar shouted, spreading his legs. He took a single step backward, the recoil compensators unable to keep him from being driven by the raw force of the MAWS. Tali and Michel ran behind him and put their shoulders against his back, while Shepard sent another pulse of distorted gravity down the hallway. Scrin armor cracked and twisted.

The Corruptor wept silver blood, but green fluids flowed out of the wounds in equal measure, repairing and sealing it as quickly as the railgun rounds tore through it. The machine-beast backed away, trying to get around the intersection again.

'Reegar flicked a switch on the MAWS' bracing handle. The barrage of railgun fire ceased for a heartbeat.

"Brace!" the quarian marine shouted in the instant of silence, and pulled the trigger. All four barrels fired at once, sending him, Tali, and Michel tumbling backward.

It was worth it. The four rounds punctured the Corrupter's head and split it open in an explosion of metallic fluids. It toppled backward, slumping to the ground.

'Reegar tried to push himself up, the massive weapon tangling among the pile of limbs. Tali and Michel had to get out from under him and haul him to his feet. Shepard grabbed a Werewolf submachinegun from the case while they did so, arming the grenade launcher module and finding, to her immense relief, that this one was loaded with sonic grenades. She pointed it down the corridor one-handed.

The Corrupter stood up, head reassembling itself in a wave of sickly green tiberium.

"This is completely unfair," Tali said as it stood, and she scooped up a Werewolf. She handed a second one to Michel, who lifted it with a bit of hesitation, but put it to her shoulder like she knew the basics. 'Reegar swept the MAWS up to bear again on the wounded Scrin as it tried to retreat.

They couldn't let it escape. Given but a few moments it could regenerate that damage and come back anew, with reinforcements.

Shepard was about to fire when the wall exploded next to the Scrin machine-beast. Shrapnel tore into the flanks of the battered creature, and it was thrown against the opposite wall.

A turian strode through the gap, a pair of Werewolf submachineguns in hand, and poured fire into the Corrupter's flank.

Garrus Vakarian advanced, firing nearly point-blank, silver blood streaming from the stunned creature's wounds. Shepard switched to assault rifle mode, and she, Tali, and Michel opened up with steady bursts into the Corrupter's mangled head. 'Reegar steadied the MAWS, switched to sequential firing, and pumped shots into the Scrin beast-machine's head and thorax.

It jerked and twisted under the constant barrage of incoming fire. Garrus dropped both Werewolves as they overheated, drew an explosive charge from his belt, and threw it _inside_ one of the Corrupter's gaping wounds. He spun and dove through the hole he'd just blasted.

_"Fire in the hole!"_ Garrus called, and everyone ducked, Michel a moment after the others. The charges detonated, sending noise and force and flying alien giblets in both directions down the hallway. Chunks of the Corrupter splattered off their shields and armor.

Shepard rose in the silence that followed, staring down the passage. The Corrupter had been blown into hundreds of pieces, with only the mangled head and front pair of legs and the massive crystal tank holding the corrosive tiberium visibly intact. Bits of the Scrin covered the hallway, and the floors, walls, and ceilings were coated in the disgusting silver slurry.

She tried passing the Werewolf to her off hand so she could activate the radio, and failed a couple of times before remembering. Shepard collapsed the weapon and clipped it to a hardpoint on the front of her armor and keyed the radio.

"Garrus?" she asked.

_"Here, Shepard,"_ he replied, climbing through the hole he'd blasted in the wall.

"Best timing in the universe," she said, and then her knees gave out.

* * *

_Advisory: Primeunit 9 deactivated - Hostile - Identification: Turian - Spectre - Garrus Vakarian - Qualifier: Insane - Designation: HostileTM1(I)_

_Advisory: Assimilatorunit 2 deactivated - confirmed: GDIsubunits - targetingassimilators_

_Advisory: Commandtransitunit 2 - 4 - 9 disabled - ETA: reinforcement: unknown - Responseunit 1: activated_

_Advisory: Hostileforce: CitadelSecurity - Number: 38 (estimate) - aircraft: transports - Number:2 - location: landingplatform_

_Advisory: Hostileforce: GDI - aircraft - Orca - Number:4 - Configuration 2211groundstrike - Location: overhead_

_Commandunit 1: Acknowledgement_

_Approaching: Grid - 1 - 45 - 41_

* * *

"Sir, another Mastermind just jumped in!" Miranda shouted over the radio as she ran for the insertion point. She could see radiation spiking on her HUD, and the roar of an intense close-quarters battle raging just twenty meters away nearly drowned out Kane's response.

"_Eliminate the wounded Mastermind!" _he ordered. _"The new arrivals will need time to recharge. Marked unit is one minute out."_

She nodded, and switched off sensor transparency, then activated her enhanced targeting suite. Her Werewolf transformed in her hands, the laser module closing and rocket module unfolding. She shouldered the submachinegun and leapt over a tangle of pipes, then hopped onto a catwalk running between two vents, which gave her a good view of the battlefield.

The remains of a Mastermind lay beneath her, almost certainly the one who had brought the reinforcements. Or at least, she guessed it was a Mastermind, due to its bulk. The Phoenix fireteam had riddled it enough firepower to blow two thirds of it to mush. Smart of them, but not enough to actually save them.

The Scrin force was made up entirely of Intruders; they had to be reacting to the attack on the relay point, and had retaliated with efficient savagery. Two of the Phoenix team were still alive, firing furiously into the dozen Intruders that were bounding toward their position close to the wounded Mastermind. Several other Intruders were blown to pieces around them, and the other Phoenix troops were in a similar state, spread across the rooftop in disparate and bloody pieces.

She had literally seconds before the Scrin finished the remaining humans and turned their attention toward her. Miranda sighted the wounded Mastermind with her rockets and let fly, then spun around and bolted across the rooftop. She heard the explosions as she ran, and Kane's voice sounded in her ear a moment later.

"_The creature is dead," _he reported. _"Now get clear, Miranda! They're coming for you!"_

"Acknowledged," she breathed, running and jumping through the maze of pipes, platforms, and vents. Contacts appeared on her local radar, and she switched off enhanced targeting and redirected suit power to speed and mobility.

There were at least two Intruders, and they moved fast - almost as fast as her. She pushed herself through the maze, ducking and jumping and weaving and trying to lose them. Miranda knew if she stopped to fight, they'd kill her in seconds. She spotted a flare of radiation and instant before a plasma cannon discharged, and wrenched herself out of the way. A column of white-hot fury screamed past her, severing metal pipes.

She dashed forward, leaping over another tangle of pipes, and something hit the pipes right behind her. There was a scream of tortured metal, a hiss of burning steam, and the Intruder tore the obstacle free and hurled it aside.

It was two bounds behind her. Miranda whirled, dropping to one knee, and fired a biotic throw directly in front of her without aiming. The Intruder, looming over her with one arm raised, took it dead in the chest. She thought she saw surprise in the glittering crystal eyes as it was tossed backward into the cloud of steam erupting from the ripped pipes.

The second Intruder landed on the rooftop beside her, and she ducked and sidestepped a swinging arm, the claws scratching her flank and shearing through the armor like paper. She ignored the pain and the blood, but the power behind the blow sent her spinning, and it took her a heartbeat to regain her balance.

That heartbeat gave the Scrin enough time to whirl around, claws extending, and bring them down toward her face. She twisted aside again, sidestepping under the blow with the grace that only nanoweave cybernetic musculature would allow, and the blade cut along her face, slashing her cheek, ear, and temple. More blood flew as she danced backward.

She wanted to scream, but her training. Her body wanted to feel terrified, but the conditioning and training, both as a Hand of Kane and before he had rescued her, left her unable to be paralyzed by panic. Miranda dodged and jumped away in a cold, terribly rational state of self-preservation, and brought her Werewolf up to fire.

The Scrin Intruder's clawed hands sheared through the weapon, slicing it to pieces with a blurring cut. She activated her omnitool as she dropped the remains of the weapon, a glowing blade flash-assembled by the device. It seemed pitiful compared with the swift, towering warrior leaping toward her, gemstone eyes promising relentless death.

The Marked of Kane smashed the Intruder to the floor.

The cyborg dropped directly on top of the Scrin warrior, half a ton of flesh, heavy metal and ceramic armor, and gleaming red lines - Kane _insisted_ on the glowing red lines. It was tall, nearly as tall as the Intruder it flattened, with spindly arms housing laser weapons, a heavy shapeshifter support gun folded up on its shoulder, and a faceplate with half a dozen glowing red sensor clusters. Heavy black armor covered the torso and legs, the bulk making the arms seem emaciated by comparison.

The Marked pointed one arm at the prone Intruder and fired a cutting beam, slicing the Scrin warrior in half at the waist. While doing so, two more Marked crashed down to the rooftop, their augmented legs barely flexing. They rose, one pausing by the tangle of wrecked pipes where the other Intruder was emerging, and fired a pair of missiles into the gap. Scrin blood and chunks of crystalline armor erupted from the gap.

"Appreciated," Miranda gasped, and the first Marked turned its bloody gaze toward her.

_"Hand,"_ the cyborg said in acknowledgment, and extended an arm._ "We must depart immediately. Scrin are closing in."_

She could hear an aircar's engines whining overhead. With a nod, she stepped over to the Marked, and the cyborg grasped her under the arms with surprisingly gentle mechanical fingers. There was a rumble as it ignited its jetpack, and it shot up toward the waiting vehicle overhead.

* * *

Corporal Nolan squeezed the trigger, and the third Ravager toppled backward as a railgun round tore it nearly in half.

The hallway went silent. He exhaled, checking his HUD, and grimaced. Of the ten troops who had been holding the hallway, only five remained: two Marine riflemen and three Zone Troopers. The hallway was blackened where plasma had burned floor plating and walls, and all three corridors were covered in Scrin remains, the creatures so impossibly tough that they had been forced to virtually blow them apart to finish them. The heavy armor of the hallway barriers was blackened and charred, where it had remained intact under the savage fury of the aliens' attacks.

But they had held, and the Scrin had withdrawn.

"Command," Ibella murmured, panting, weapon drooping in his armor-assisted grasp. "Bravo One. Enemy has withdrawn from our sector. Requesting medical and reinforcements. We have heavy-"

Ibella, the barrier before him, and the Marine next to him slammed into the wall. Blood and gore blasted out from their bodies as they were smashed flat. Nolan's shields flared, deflecting high-pressure blood and flying chunks of armor, and he blinked in disbelief and shock.

"Contact, center hall-" the last Marine shouted, raising his weapon before being flattened against the wall in the same brutal, messy manner. Nolan snapped up his weapon, switching to the ion module, and leapt to the corner that the attack was coming from. He leaned around the corner, shifter ready, and spotted something down the passage.

It looked like a Mastermind, but this one had short, blue spikes all along its upper body, lightning dancing between the crystals jutting from its flesh. Half-remembered briefings and reports from Akuze flashed through his head.

_A Battlemind!_

He squeezed the trigger, not giving himself time to feel the terror that recognition should have evoked. The beam struck the Scrin warrior in the flank, and blue crystals and armored hide were blown apart by the blast. The Battlemind jerked from the impact, and retaliated.

The blast did not kill Nolan instantly. His armor crumpled as a wave of force smashed into him, and the breath blew out of his lungs. He slammed into the far wall, pain flashing through his body, and his armored form slid to the floor. Blood and crushed armor splattered over his body as the rest of his squad was killed where they stood.

The Battlemind clambered up the hallway, followed by more Scrin warriors, and passed Nolan's prone form. An Intruder strode past and paused, gemstone eyes peering down at him.

Nolan felt a vibration pass through the air, and another, slightly different, rattled his battered armor. The Battlemind paused for an instant, and then a low rumble filled the hallway and echoed off the prone human's armor.

The Intruder raised an arm, bladed fingers gleaming, and stabbed them into the Zone Trooper's helmet.

* * *

Locke lifted the last Intruder with one hand and hurled it off the side of the building. He turned, looking over the destruction on the rooftop, and the remaining Intruders that he had slain after recovering from that woman's trickery. The firefight with the Scrin had lasted only a few moments - only four of the dozen Intruders were still intact after tangling with his team and the Nod agent - but it had been enough for the woman to do her business.

He scowled and keyed his comm.

"Sir," he said. "Rooftop is secure, but the Mastermind is dead."

There was a pause, and then a response.

"_Acceptable. Extraction inbound."_

* * *

They sat in the office, the brandy running down their throat after closing the link to Locke. The burn of the drink wasn't enough to distract them from the emotion that plagued their processes.

Annoyance.

The Mastermind scan had been incomplete. They only had a limited understanding of the communications architecture, and would have to capture or wound and study more specimens.

But for now, they had enough.

They opened a channel to a node installed in the top floor of the GDI Embassy, placed there years ago. Many years ago. Back when they had been _he_, and his name had been Harper. Before the first time he tried accessing the aliens' network transit network, and found something _else_.

The quantum entanglement communicator embedded in the transmitter activated the node and the radiation transmitter. They analyzed the input, and studied the radiation markers and communication using temporal phase pulses between the Scrin creatures in the Embassy. They compared the pulses with the Mastermind's architecture - specifically, the control systems.

It took them ten seconds - four of which were spent in internal debate over the best attack vector - to determine the method of attack. Finally satisfied, they sent the signal.

It would be a clumsy, rudimentary attack, analogous to a child firing a shotgun nearly as tall as himself. But as they watched the signal propagate through the local communications network, cutting through one alien after another, they knew they had taken the first, critical step.

And across the Embassy, every Scrin warrior and creature stopped in their tracks and _screamed._ Buzzers twisted and flew apart, the swarms of bladed threads collapsing and dying. Assimilators ceased their intrusions into the network, and the GDI EVAs began to retake captured subsystems. Intruders and Disintegrators stopped in mid-step, and were cut down by desperate human defenders.

The invaders recovered in less than a minute, but in the time it took the Scrin to do so, GDI troops seized the moment of weakness and launched the counterattack.

They smiled. That was the best they could offer for now, at least.

They tipped back the brandy, swallowing it, and settled back in their chair to watch a star die.

* * *

**INTRUSION!**

_**PRIORITY: ALL UNITS: PURGEPURGEPURGE**__**PURGEPURGE**__**!**_

_PU__**RGE **__-11-B__**9l**__33A__**AtvaN:**__**c**__**oM**__**Me**_**ncin**_**G**_

_ST__**ANDB**__y_

_STANDBY_

_standby_

_Diagnotics: initiated - Attacktrace: initiated - Attackanalysis: initiated_

_Compiling: functional: subunits - primeunits - commandunits_

_Commandunit 1 - Report: unaffected: Grid - 1 - 45 - 41 secured_

_Assuming: direct control_

_Advisory: notamusing - acknowledged - ignored_

_Commandunit 1: Directive - Purged: Subunits- reroutetoCommandunit 1_

_Target: HostileTM1(I) - HostileHF1 - HostileQF1 - HostileQM1_

_Termination: maximumpriority - survival: irrelevant_

* * *

_**Codex - Aliens - Non-Council-Species - Scrin: Masterminds**_

"_Masterminds" are the Scrin analogue to field officers and commandos. Lacking in weaponry designed for direct combat applications, Masterminds instead use a number of esoteric technologies to support other units in the field. A relatively rare and - conjectured to be - expensive creature to employ, Masterminds have been encountered on a general ratio of one per Scrin division-analogue. The substantial numbers of Masterminds employed by Reaper-18 forces is a great concern._

_Masterminds employ a method of teleportation technology that uses methods similar to the "phase-shifting" technology that they employed in the Third Tiberium War. This technology allows them to transport small groups of Scrin weapons/warriors over long distances. In addition, this technology can be used to "trap" matter in a cage of phase-shifted space._

_The most frightening and insidious ability of the Mastermind, however, is their "mind control" technology. The device in question is mounted inside a Mastermind's "head" section, and is able to swiftly and efficiently override the neural network of any organic lifeform using an as-yet-unknown means. Masterminds frequently use this ability to turn entire squads or vehicle crews against their comrades, and in the ensuing chaos will take control of survivors and continue to turn them against their compatriots._

_Masterminds are the only known form of Scrin species to attempt any form of communication with other lifeforms. Survivors of Mastermind attacks who "conversed" with such creatures reported that the Masterminds would create thoughts in their own brains in an effort to communicate, though the aliens would only demand that the victim immediately surrender and cooperate to make a mental takeover faster and more painless._

_Two known variants of Masterminds have been encountered. The first is the Prodigy, a version exclusive to the Traveler sects, capable of wider-ranging mind control effects and even greater mobility and phase-shifting range. The second is the Battlemind, a version which has been observed to eschew mind controlling technology in favor of gravity manipulation capability, enabling it to inflict devastating damage to infantry through brute force crushing or throwing. Battleminds have only been sighted among the unidentified Scrin forces behind the assault on Akuze, and the later appearances of Reaper-18 troops after Eden Prime._

* * *

_**Codex - Aliens - Non-Council Species - Scrin: Corrupters**_

"_Corrupters" serve as a support weapons system for Scrin forces, analogous to a light armored vehicle but much more agile in close-quarters battle. The large, spherical "tank" on the rear of the Corrupter houses a form of highly corrosive, non-volatile liquid tiberium, which can be projected out of the "head" section of the creature. _

_Offensively, the Corrupter serves as an anti-infantry and anti-structural assault weapon, using the destructive liquid tiberium to rapidly melt and destroy hardened targets that can resist other Scrin weaponry, and swiftly eliminate infantry. However, the liquid tiberium has a second function: any Scrin creature or structure exposed to this liquid tiberium can actively incorporate it into their body structure, repairing physical damage with startling speed. _

_Like many Scrin "vehicles" the Corrupter blurs the line between organic and mechanical, with seamless transition between soft tissue and hard mechanical-analogue structures. It is virtually impervious to infantry small arms. Reaper-18 variants have been observed to be even more durable than the "standard" forms, often using their own supply of liquid tiberium to heal injuries sustained in battle as quickly as they receive them, and shrugging off most man-portable weaponry._

* * *

_**Author's Notes:**_ The biggest challenge in this chapter was keeping the Scrin powerful and scary while at the same time letting the protagonists survive the battle with them. I wanted the Scrin to seem nearly unstoppable, with the heroes surviving through grit, fury, and raw firepower against a relentless, impossibly tough enemy.

I'll also put up some props for fellow author Gregg Landsman, whose Glorious Shotgun Princess story (a Mass Effect/Exalted crossover of absolute awesomeness) has had some influence in this chapter, notably the segment about 'Reegars being badasses. That story presented the really cool idea of the various clans being specialists, and I knew I wanted to run with it, but I've got to give Gregg Landsman credit for the concept.

There were some references to Eagle's Fall and The Verge War in this chapter, specifically to some tech used by the characters, especially Locke. Locke's shields are also a nod to the difference between the shields in ME1 - where biotics went right through them - and the shields in ME2 and ME3, where shields blocked biotics. There are other references too; the "Grindstone" being an automatic modification/upgrade piece of equipment GDI will be using in The Verge War and the batarian-created undersuit nanorepair tech referencing...something much more spoilery. Deus Ex fans might note some similarities to another character's abilities; we're going to be exploring some of the transhumanist elements of this fused setting later on.

Next chapter will be the climax of this battle, with a singleminded Scrin juggernaut relentlessly closing in on our heroes.

Until next chapter . . . .


	13. Chapter 13: Willpower

_**Chapter Thirteen: Willpower**_

Garrus took point as they hurried through the empty, gray hallways toward the armory station. Kal'Reegar took the rear, the MAWS' weight slowing him down. Shepard didn't like it, but she was in no position to argue, seeing as how she was missing her arm.

"Commander," Michel said, her tone insistent, "We must stop to clean the wound."

"No time," Shepard grunted, and the injectors in her armor hissed, pumping another wave of glorious painkillers into her bloodstream. She was still vaguely lucid, but would need one hell of a dose of stims to counter the hazy sensation in her brain.

"We'll stop at the armory," Garrus said. The two submachineguns he had been using before were clipped to hardpoints on his back, around the armor's jetpack. Between his shouldered assault rifle and the collapsed marksman carbine attached to his armor, he more resembled a mobile armory.

"Garrus, I'm-" Shepard started, but he held up a hand.

"Relieved until we address your dismemberment, Shepard," he replied. She opened her mouth to protest, but then paused and nodded with a weariness she didn't expect. She didn't argue as they hurried to the station, with Kal'Reegar taking up security at the doorway. Shepard glanced around the long room, lined with weapons racks and lockers, and blinked. There was no one on duty at the guard station.

"How did you access the armory?" she asked. The quarian marine shrugged, and his omnitool glowed for a moment. "Right. Quarian."

"Not a hacker, ma'am," he said. "Flash-fabbed explosives. We're not all tech-heads like Tali."

Shepard let herself slump down against a wall inside the station, and Michel went to work doctoring what was left of her arm. Garrus stepped into the armory for a moment, coming back with another Werewolf rifle attached to his back, and her HUD showed a grenade module and machinegun attachments. Could never have too much firepower, she figured. He also had a case of additional modules and a crate of grenades; markings on the side showed they were sonic variants.

"You sure you're not Santa?" Shepard slurred through the fuzzy haze surrounding her. The turian's mandibles twitched, likely in confusion. Shepard could feel Michel working on her arm, and heard the faint hissing of a medigel sheath sealing over the wound.

"Get these fitted," he said, unfolding his Werewolf submachineguns and removing one of the modules. Tali set aside her submachinegun in favor of a Werewolf with a shotgun base frame, and she quickly began swapping out modules. Shepard found herself vaguely annoyed that non-GDI personnel were familiar enough with their weapons to switch out modules so quickly.

Shepard forced thoughts through the haze as she used her free hand to grab some spare sonic grenades and clip them to her belt. They were relatively safe at the moment; incoming reports from the EVAs indicated that the Scrin attack was faltering. But she still had to secure the quarians.

"There, should be sterilized," Michel said. "We'll need to get you-"

"Commander!" came a call over the radio, and she perked up. She always perked up when Havoc was talking, lest he get away with something explosive when she wasn't looking.

"Copy, Admiral," she said. The fuzzier parts of her brain asked what had happened to callsigns, before she remembered they hadn't had time to assign any.

"Shepard, EVA says you've got both quarians on the second floor," he said. "Confirm that?"

"Yeah," she muttered. "Confirm."

"You okay, Shepard?" he asked after a moment. She grunted in reply.

"Lost about ten percent of my body mass, but other than that, I'm good," she replied.

"Alright then, keep those-" he stopped. Shepard blinked, waiting for him to finish, and it took him several seconds to get back. When he did, his words were tighter and even more urgent than usual.

"Shepard, we have a Battlemind blasting its way toward you," he said.

She shot straight up, the haze vanishing as a fresh bout of adrenaline lanced through her, chasing a tidal wave of images of Akuze.

"Feed it to me," she hissed, and a moment later her HUD showed her images captured from internal cameras, showing a familiar shape: bulky body atop four thin legs, gleaming sapphire eyes, blue crystal spikes jutting from its back and flanks. It led a gaggle of other Scrin troops through the corridors, and lightning flashed along its back as it smashed open a blast door with a wave of invisible force. The Embassy schematic showed an icon representing the creature on the same level as them, and punching its way through everything that stood between it and their location.

Shepard access her suit's subsystems, and after only a moment of hesitation, pumped a dangerous amount of stims into her bloodstream to counteract the painkillers.

"Everybody, up," she barked, her words no longer slurred, and clambered to her feet. Pain lanced through the stump of her arm, but she ignored it and Michel's startled protests. Everyone looked up at her as Shepard grabbed her Werewolf with her good hand.

"We have to move, now," she ordered.

"Shepard," Garrus started, but she shook her head sharply, and ordered her suit to pump more stimulants into her bloodstream.

"We have to _move,_" she barked, and no one argued with the lucidity or command in her words, not even the Spectre.

* * *

Kaidan's fist slammed into the weakened floor, and chunks of broken ceramic hurled up into the air. Jacob chased it up into the room, Werewolf ready, and was shooting the Assimilator that filled the room beyond before he'd reached the apex of his jetpack-fueled leap. The creature recoiled, silver blood flying, and fell to the battered floor in a heap of crystal and tangled limbs. Jacob landed on the edge of the hole, sweeping the room, but nothing else inhabited the office.

"Third node secured," Jacob called.

A few moments later, his HUD flashed, and an EVA's voice murmured in his ear.

"Scrin intrusion processes terminated," it reported. "Reestablishing control over Embassy security."

"Finally," Jacob grunted. Kaidan's voice sounded in his ear as he contacted the Admiral.

"Alenko to Havoc, come in," he called. "We've got the last Assimilator. EVA says we've retaken control."

"Ah, confirm," Havoc replied, distracted. "Dammit, not good, not good. Stand by."

Jacob hopped back down into the room below, and glanced to Kaidan. The mutant officer's face was unreadable behind his helmet, but he shook his head. Jacob nodded.

"Okay, back," Parker said suddenly. "Alenko, Taylor, we've got a pile of shit back here. Get your asses down to the main foyer on level two. The Scrin are pushing hard."

"I thought we were winning," Jacob muttered as they hurried out of the room and down the silver-coated hallway beyond.

"We are," Kaidan said. "And I think that just made them even more desperate."

* * *

The EVA units moved fast. The burst of confusion and chaos among the Scrin had let them shut out the intrusion processes and reactivate some of the defenses, but destroying the last Assimilator let them retake full control of the Embassy security. Blast doors slammed down around the Scrin, mass effect barriers blocked off corridors compromised by the invaders, automated gun turrets deployed at strategic locations, and blinded sensors reactivated and fed precise enemy numbers and locations to the depleted but energized defenders.

And judging by its reaction, the Battlemind did not give a single fuck.

Blast doors crumpled before it. Barriers were smashed down, their capacitors overloaded and disabled by pulses of raw force. GDI defenders moved to intercept, only to find the Scrin simply going around them, punching down intervening walls and crashing through offices and storage rooms and maintenance closets. Twice, GDI squads were in the direct path of the Battlemind. Of the first squad, four were killed instantly when the wall next to them exploded, crushing them with metal and ceramic debris, and the last two were killed within seconds by the Battlemind's escort, with barely enough time to return fire. The second squad managed a controlled retreat, trading fire with the Battlemind's escort. They survived for fourteen seconds, with the Battlemind blasting individual soldiers and flattening them against floors and walls.

The EVAs watched this, collating data, and comparing it with reports and footage from the encounters with similar Battleminds on Akuze. As Rear Admiral Parker watched the men under his command fight and scream and die, he listened to the EVAs' dispassionate reports and conclusions as he issued orders through his omnitool, most of them nonverbally by moving icons around on the Embassy display.

"Estimate with ninety-three percent probability that Battlemind weapons system requires two to six seconds to recharge between firing, dependent on mass moved and kinetic energy expended." the EVA's empty female voice reported. A moment later, it spoke again. Or maybe it was another EVA, as the AIs did not have personality programming or even voice differentiation.

"Drop in Battlemind power expenditure noted when breaching section Two-Seven-Alpha compared with assault on defensive position in section One-Seven-Beta," it said. "Comparison of intervening incidents shows gradual decrease of expenditure following consistent curve. Total yield of weapon system reduced by seven percent between incidents."

"It's running out of juice," Parker said. There was a pause.

"High likelihood," the EVA responded.

Parker nodded. The roar of another lifting aircar filled his ears, and he could hear Ambassador Udina shouting orders behind him. Once the Ambassador had gotten his head wrapped around the situation, he'd taken direct command of the evacuation process, freeing up Parker to direct the defense. The moment the Scrin anti-air had been neutralized, Udina had gotten people onto aircars and started getting them clear. Parker had to admit that Udina was sterner than his initial surprise and confusion let on.

Havoc switched over to tracking Shepard's squad, as they advanced across the second level toward the vehicle hangar. He opened a link to their comms.

"Shepard, we got worse news," he called.

"Lay it on me," she replied. There was a weariness in her voice that matched the bad things he was getting from her suit's bio-readings.

"That Battlemind is blasting straight through toward you," he reported. "You need to get those quarians here, now!"

"Working our way toward you, sir," she grunted. "Keep the doors open."

* * *

Garrus paused at the entrance to the main foyer on the second floor, where but a few hours ago they had met Admiral Havoc. He checked the room, and collated that with his feed to EVA, and nodded.

"Clear," the Spectre reported, and they moved into the foyer. Shepard paused to pump another burst of stims and painkillers into her mangled shoulder, knowing it wouldn't be healthy for her but not caring. The gray-white floors and walls of the foyer were relatively pristine, with only a few small drops of red blood marring the stark GDI aesthetic, likely from wounded dragged or carried through the room.

"Where we headed, Shepard?" Kal'Reegar asked, covering their rear with the MAWS.

"Main hangar," she replied, nodding toward a door on the far side of the room. "That way."

They started moving toward the door when another set across the room hissed open. A slew of guns rose and sighted the opening door, but the IFF tags Shepard saw on her visor confirmed their status.

"Hold fire!" she barked. At the same time, another voice shouted "Friendlies, coming in!"

Nearly a dozen GDI Marines swept into the room, several limping or with scorched . A check of their suits biometrics showed all four of them were wounded. The lead Marine's tags identified him as a Sergeant Rhitt, who was breathing heavily. The Marines covered the door they'd just passed through as if they were expecting hostiles.

"Report, Sergeant," Shepard said. Rhitt paused, panting.

"Ma'am,' he said. "Uh. Scrin units advancing. We've been engaging them, but-"

A tremendous explosion rolled up the hallway from the direction the Marines had come, followed by the clatter and crunch of smashed ceramics and the screech of twisted metal. Shepard heard one of the Marines bellow "Contact!" before the distinct hiss and sizzle of Scrin beam weaponry erupted and blue-white streams sliced up the corridor. One Marine fell, bisected across the chest, chunks of armor exploding off of his torso in white-hot fragments, while the others opened fire with fusillade of mass accelerators and grenades.

"Move!" Shepard shouted, waving her arm toward the corridor leading in the general direction of the hangar. Through the doorway, the crystalline insect forms of Scrin warriors could be seen, skittering and loping and lunging forward as they fired, bulling through small arms fire with relentless determination.

Beyond them, Shepard could see the looming, shining, spike-covered specter of the Battlemind, preparing to fire again.

"Rhitt, pull your Marines back!" Shepard bellowed, while pumping her arm and focusing dark energy around her. She targeted the lead Scrin warrior, an eager Disintegrator, and shaped the energy into a crackling, twisting blue bolt that rippled off her arm and careened down the corridor. It struck the alien in the middle of its cannon-head and hurled it down the corridor to crash into an Intruder and another Disintegrator. Both beasts were bowled over in a tangle of legs and claws, and the Scrin fire faltered.

The Marines peeled off from their position and retreated, joining Shepard's group as they reached the hallway and running toward safety. Shepard spotted another Intruder bounding over the tangle of bodies, but then heard the deep, pounding _thoom_ of Garrus' marksman rifle. The Scrin warrior tumbled, one of its arms blasted off in a shower of silver slurry.

Then Kal'Reegar opened up with the MAWS.

Bodies shattered and burst, shards of broken crystal and gouts of metallic fluid flying. The MAWS thundered a steady pulse of railgun rounds down the corridor, and every shot blew apart Scrin infantry. The aliens scattered, ducking through doorways or diving against the walls of the hallway to avoid the scything barrage. Several of the MAWS rounds struck the Battlemind itself - or at least attempted to, only to shatter against an unseen kinetic barrier a meter away from the creature's skin. The Marines reached the hallway under his intense covering fire, and he started backing away toward them while the majority of the Scrin were cowed.

The Battlemind was not part of the majority. Electricity crackled off of the crystal spikes on its back and flank, railgun rounds deflecting off its shields, and it calmly strode down the alien-blood-soaked passage.

"Reegar, fall back!" Shepard shouted, and he simply nodded. The quarian ceased fire and spun toward them, and took several heavy, long steps toward them. Shepard knew he wasn't going to make it before the Battlemind fired, not with that strength-assist frame weighing him down. She clenched her fist again, dark energy swirling around her, and sent a biotic pull toward him.

The doorframe of the Scrin's hallway shattered, and a kinetic blast smashed into Kal'Reegar a heartbeat before Shepard's pull reached him. She saw his shields flare as a cloud of debris - shattered masonry, jagged chunks of twisted metal, broken Scrin and human remains - crashed into him and swept him across the foyer to smash into the far wall.

Shepard stared for a heartbeat, and heard Tali shout something, denial and rage and horror mixing in her voice. The Commando blinked a couple of times at the space where Kal'Reegar had been, and then spun away from the door, striking the control panel and sealing it closed. A heartbeat later one of the embassy EVAs locked it down.

* * *

The wraparound holo-projector showed a hundred real-time feeds from a myriad range of sources, ranging from the mundane (dashboard cameras of news aircars and personal recording devices) to the highly secretive (primary sensor feeds from multiple turian frigates). On most of them were two equally interesting subjects: the attack on the GDI Embassy in the Wards, and the destruction of the turian cruiser _Valedictum_.

The latter was being fired upon from multiple ships, as well as the Citadel's exterior defenses. Mass accelerator fire tore through the already-battered hull plates, crumpling decks and setting portions of the wounded vessel ablaze. The Citadel Defense Fleet went about their business with ruthless efficiency, and the ship bowed and cracked under the barrage. The reactor went dead, and a fiery explosion that sent golden gouts bursting from the middle of the ship heralded its end. But the CDF was unsatisfied, and continued pounding on the compromised ship, ripping it apart until little was left but twisted, free-floating scrap in an expanding cloud.

It was cold comfort to Kane. Of course, little comforted him these days.

Black eyes shifted away from the destruction of the Scrin's Trojan Horse, and focused on the GDI Embassy. He switched views to one of the C-Sec feeds, which showed a burning factory halfway across the Ward, where Citadel Security had finally located the main Scrin staging area. They had responded with a decisiveness that Kane approved of. His sensors across the Citadel were confirming that the odd radiation signatures associated with the Scrin had been largely eliminated as well.

The Embassy was a different matter, though. C-Sec troops were pouring into the building from both upper and lower access points, but Kane's limited feeds told him they would not arrive in time. He watched as one of the quarians vanished in a cloud of kinetic force and hurtling debris, and the remaining Scrin move in close behind Shepard and the remaining quarian woman. If she died - or at least, if she died before that critical information she had could be passed on - then matters would become a lot more difficult.

He watched the situation develop, unable to do anything about it with his limited resources. It was a discomforting feeling; on Earth he had been the the puppet master, but now, in the larger galaxy, his resources were . . . diminished. Penetrating into a society spanning a galaxy, with more than two thousand years' worth of history and tradition, was a difficult prospect. The grand displays of his power were smoke and mirrors, and nowhere was that more apparent than now, with so little capacity to impact what was happening beyond his cat's paws.

Messages flicked across the screen. Miranda was confirming that they had escaped the Phoenix soldiers on the rooftop, and that the Masterminds were destroyed. They were currently slipping out of detection range of local C-Sec response units. A sliver of good news, for once. He had yet to determine the precise motives behind the Phoenix attack on the Masterminds, but Kane had noted the unexpected disruption of the Scrin operations in the Embassy and identified the connection immediately. Despite the obvious effects of the attack on the Scrin's network and how it was aiding the GDI defenders, he doubted the group's motives were of pure intent. Extremists rarely had such.

Despite the gravity of the situation, Kane managed a smirk. The irony of that thought and how he used extremists to his own ends was not lost.

Now, he just had to wait and watch and adjust his calculations. He hoped his other pawn could do her job properly, despite losing a limb in the process. If she succeeded at keeping the quarian survivor alive, then they could act more decisively. If she failed . . . .

He hoped it would not come to that, but even if the quarian died, it wouldn't be a complete disaster. Both she and Shepard were pawns, and ultimately disposable.

* * *

Shepard fought to keep her legs steady as she ran, struggling through the pain. The period application of painkillers didn't help her too much - not with the amount of stims in her blood to keep her upright. The eclectic group of battered survivors ran through the corridors toward the hangar, and over the pounding their boots they could hear the walls scream and shatter under the Battlemind's abuse. The hallway leading to the hangar ran through a series of offices and storage rooms, which gave them cover from the smaller, faster Scrin combat units as they ran.

As much as she wanted to move at a dead sprint, Shepard knew that was a bad idea in not-completely secured areas, so they moved at a quick, bounding pace, with Tali, Michel, Rhitt, and most of the Marines leading, while Shepard, Garrus, and two of the Marines took up the rear. They had to negotiate several twists and turns and intersections, all of which took far too much time to secure before they could move on. They could hear the pounding and screech of torn metal as the Battlemind and the Scrin warriors with it blasted through the sealed doors and hallways in dogged pursuit.

"Scrin, our rear!" Garrus shouted as they ran down the passage, and he, Shepard, and the Marines whirled around to fire. An Intruder leapt around the corner of the hallway behind them, its plasma projector glowing white hot, and promptly exploded as Garrus put a heavy round through its neck, the Marines riddled it with three rapid bursts that tore into its torso, and Shepard's biotics launched it backward to smash against the wall so hard that silver slurry splattered the ceiling.

"Intersection secure," Tali called over the radio, her voice tight. Shepard could hear the fury and pain in it.

_No shit,_ she thought, tightening her jaw. _Mourn later. Kill Scrin now._

They backed up the hallway, weapons and biotics at the ready for another attacker. A second Intruder peeked around the corner, and Garrus split its head in half with another shot before it could retreat.

"They're getting desperate," the Spectre murmured. "Desperation makes them sloppy."

"Didn't think these things had emotions," one of the Marines breathed.

"They feel pain," Shepard grunted, preparing another biotic strike. On her HUD, she could see the local map indicating they were close to the intersection. "Go right. Twenty meter to another intersection, and left another twenty to the hangar."

"Understood," Tali replied.

"Where's the rest?" Sergeant Rhitt said as they reached the intersection and the rest of the group bounded forward. "They should be dogging our heels, but we've only see-"

The walls just a few meters ahead of Tali's group exploded in a torrent of plasma and hurled masonry, knocking one Marine off his feet, and a wave of crystalline forms bounded through. The hallway turned into a hurricane of noise and gunfire, a point-blank exchange of hypervelocity slugs and blinding blue-white energy released in deafening intensity. The Marines opened up at point blank range into the pack of bounding Disintegrators that rushed through, the Scrin leaping over the debris or running along the walls. Several of the quadruped aliens were blasted apart before they could begin firing, but they covered a pack of Intruders as they surged into the gap. An Intruder leading the charge raised its plasma projector as it leapt through the debris, and Garrus blew its arm off. Shepard shouted a curse and hurled another Intruder down the hallway with a biotic thrust.

A Marine was impaled through the chest with a long, shining spear of green crystal, his body pinned against the opposite wall. The Ravager, visible through the opening in the wall, stomped through the gap while surrounded by a cloud of Buzzers. The razor-edged aliens swooped down upon the dazed Marine on the floor, and he screamed and thrashed as they cut into his flesh. Another Marine took a tiberium spear through the gut and smashed into the wall.

A torrent of red-gold plasma suddenly swept over the Ravager and many of the Buzzers, and as the huge Scrin warrior retreated in abrupt agony, Tali shot it in the middle of its gemstone eyes with her shotgun. Said eyes shattered from the blast, and it howled a strangled, reverberating cry of suffering. Buzzers twisted and flared in white-gold burst of heat and incinerated threads, and the tiny aliens scattered and fell.

"That's for Kal, _bosh'tet!_" Tali shouted, and triggered another surge of fire from her jury-rigged omnitool. The Ravager's armor twisted as the heat tore through its body; whatever alien biology it possessed was still as vulnerable to fire as carbon-based life. She fired another two shotgun blasts, and it toppled backward, burning and limp.

The Scrin did not break, despite the ferocity of the defense. They surged forward, plasma scything across the hallway and slicing down Marines. An Intruder leapt upon Sergeant Rhitt, clawed hands slicing into his arms and across his throat before Garrus could shoot it down. Doctor Michel was dragging one wounded Marine away from the fighting, firing her Werewolf with her free hand into a Disintegrator that bounded too close. Shepard sent a warping field tearing through another cloud of Buzzers, while hunting for the Battlemind. It hadn't torn down the wall, which meant that it had to be somewhere nearby, waiting to-

She spotted a sudden surge of motion on her radar from the corridor behind them and whirled around, gathering everything she had into a single massive thrust.

"Battlemind, behind us!" she shouted in desperate terror.

The Battlemind tore through the wall behind her in a torrent of noise and force and whipping debris, charging through the hole it blasted. It advanced straight into the teeth of Shepard's throw, which impacted it dead center in its gemstone eyes. The massive Scrin was knocked backward off its feet into the room it just pounded through, and let out a furious sound akin to someone angrily hammering a hundred wind chimes against a synth-music keyboard. It started to rise - even prone, the damned thing was taller than Shepard - and electricity crackled over the crystal spikes as it prepared to fire off another blast.

Which was why Shepard dropped her Werewolf and used her single arm to rip off and chuck her entire belt of sonic grenades into the room with the Battlemind. She hopped back and drunkenly leapt out of the way of the detonation.

The sonic detonation shook the floor and sent a deafening burst of noise crashing over her, but her helmet deflected the worst of the audible assault, and she clambered to her feet. The Battlemind's howl of anger redoubled, and she guessed it was hurting pretty badly. Shepard stumbled to her dropped Werewolf and scooped it up with grim determination. The Commando knew from bitter experience that there was no way she could kill it with small arms and biotics alone, but she had to do _something _before it recovered and squashed them.

She stepped around to the hole in the wall, and raised the submachinegun one-handed. The massive beast lay stunned, silver goop hemorrhaging from the beast's flanks, and she scowled in fury before squeezing the trigger. Rounds erupted from the weapon, smashing into the Battlemind's kinetic barriers to no effect. With a snarl, she held down the trigger, and the Werewolf roared in her hand until it overheated.

Not a single round had punched through, and the Battlemind started moving again, its wounds slowly sealing back up as she watched.

"Goddammit," she breathed, more tired than angry.

A three-fingered hand grabbed her shoulder and threw her down. As she hit the floor, a line of plasma scythed through where her neck had been a moment before. Garrus, crouched beside her, shouldered his rifle and fired again, and an Intruder let out a resonant howl of pain. Shepard rolled over and shot to a crouch, muttering her thanks to Garrus.

The savage exchange between their group and the Scrin had left most of the aliens down, save for several who were taking cover further up the passage and firing brief bursts of plasma with the surviving Marines and Tali. But the Scrin had dealt as well as they received; only a couple of the GDI Marines were still alive, and she could hear the Battlemind rising to its feet. The floor was covered in the mangled body parts of Scrin and humans, and red blood mixed freely with silver blood-slurry.

Despite the grim situation, Shepard saw a chance.

"Charge them," Shepard muttered. Garrus nodded, firing another shot that clipped an Intruder's shoulder. He understood that if they let themselves get pinned down by the remaining Scrin, the Battlemind would crush them - literally - the second it emerged. She knew that for all their firepower, they couldn't kill the Battlemind fast enough. But if they assaulted the alien survivors, they might be able to break through and reach the hangar.

"Squad, prepare to assault!" Shepard shouted, and acknowledgments came from the survivors as they traded fire with the Scrin. Shepard glanced to Tali; the quarian's suit had several burns and at least one rupture in it, but she was ready to move. Michel had the lone surviving wounded Marine over her shoulder.

The Battlemind stirred behind them.

Shepard surged to her feet and prepared to loose another barrage of biotics.

"Friendlies, coming in!" called a voice over the radio.

Then two friendly icons appeared on her HUD, and a moment later Jacob Taylor and Kaidan Alenko burst into the hallway from the intersection a few meters behind the Scrin troops. They whirled on the aliens, and a sudden burst of biotics ripped two of the aliens off their feet.

Shepard's group surged forward, advancing and firing on the off-balance Scrin troops as the ones who were still standing whirled to face the new threat. Jacob's shotgun module blew the torso of an Intruder to pieces, while Kaidan fired into the chest of another as it charged. It bulled through the rounds smashing into its chest without slowing, and raised its claws to strike the Lieutenant down.

Kaidan charged forward in an abrupt burst of speed and shoulder-checked the Intruder so hard it smashed to a complete halt. The mutant set his feet, jammed the Werewolf into the underside of the Intruder's chin, and blew the thing's head off. Then he grabbed the stunned alien's arm and pivoted, slamming it down to the floor, where two swift, rapid stomps crumpled its armor plating enough that another half-dozen rounds finished it.

The remaining Scrin stood no chance, and hypervelocity fire cut them down as they tried to face an attack from both sides. Biotics slammed them to the floor or pinned them against ceilings where they were cut down with ruthless efficiency.

"Lieutenants," Shepard grunted as the last Scrin warrior went down. "Damned good timing."

"Yes ma'am," Jacob said. She saw his helmet flick toward her missing arm, but he said nothing. "We'll cover your back, ma'am."

Motion behind them. Shepard didn't need to check.

"Go, go!" she shouted, and they broke into a run as the Battlemind finally emerged.

* * *

_Warning: Multiple ruptures detected. Internal seals engaged._

Weight pressed down on his chest. Pain rolled through his body. He opened his eyes, and for an instant he thought he was blind, before realizing he was covered in debris.

_Warning: Foreign microbes detected. Warning: Foreign fungi detected. Warning: Foreign virus detected. Automatic antibiotics dispensed._

He was bleeding; the sticky wetness in his back said as much. Medigel was already patching that up, and internal suit seals were online, partitioning off the damage. Still, he needed a clean room ASAP.

He keyed his suit's internal biometrics, and the HUD displayed his injuries. He glanced over them with the quick, practiced eye of someone who'd gotten battered often enough to be intimately familiar with the readouts. Nothing broken, nothing hemorrhaging. No neural damage. Damned lucky.

"Can't kill me," Kal'Reegar grunted, and the strength-assist frame - the same thing that slowed him down enough to let him get slapped by that big spiky alien bastard - atoned for its misdeeds by helping him shift the heaviest debris off his chest.

He pushed himself to his feet and glanced at the MAWS. To his surprise, the damn thing's diagnostics said the weapon was still functional.

"Heh. Good engineering," he grunted, and hefted the massive weapon. "I'm keepin' this." Pushing through the debris, he limped across the foyer toward the door that the others had been running down right before he got plastered.

"I'm comin' for you, ya big spiky _bosh'tet_," the quarian muttered with a rueful grin, and the limp turned into a jog.

* * *

Garrus took the lead of their battered group, worrying that more Scrin were in the building prepping for another pincer movement. The fact that internal sensors said that all the Scrin save the Battlemind were dead just made him more wary. Despite his misgivings, the group managed to reach the hangar without incident. The door was guarded by a six-man squad of GDI Marines, who waved to them frantically as they ran flat-out to the vehicle bay.

"Get to cover!" Shepard shouted. "Get to cov-_oooh_." She stumbled half a step as the painkillers apparently flushed into her system again, but then recovered. Good; Garrus didn't want to carry her, hard-as-nails or not. The GDI troops were heeding her warning, moving back into the hangar as they approached, and within a few moments the entire group had entered the vehicle garage. The rumble and hum of lifting aircars struck him from all sides, and at the far end of the bay he could see the soft violet light of the Serpent Nebula spilling into the bay, competing with the harsh blue-gray lights that GDI loved.

Garrus scanned the area as they hurried across the room, noting several more GDI troops taking up defensive positions, while there were few noncombatants remaining. He also spotted Admiral Parker by virtue of the fact that he was waving his beefy arms and bellowing Shepard's name at the top of his lungs.

"Shepard!" he shouted. "Hey! Over here!"

Subtle.

She took a couple of steps toward the Admiral, and Garrus had just enough time to notice that Ambassador Udina was giving orders to the remaining personnel trying to evacuate when one of the walls exploded in and the Battlemind made its presence known.

_That thing is just copying my style,_ he thought even as he whirled toward the threat, and everyone in the room who had a gun opened fire.

Lightning flashed, and cars, bodies, and maintenance equipment went flying.

Many people would have been freaked out that someone was hurling cars at them. Garrus Vakarian, however, was a Spectre who had faced angry asari matriarchs before, so this was nothing new. He sidestepped around one flying aircar, and another skipped over the floor toward him. He ducked underneath it, the metal spinning mere centimeters overhead, and sighted the Battlemind through the scope of his marksman carbine as the car crashed down behind him with a deck-shaking screech of metal-on-metal.

His visor fed him markers indicating targets based on observed weakness and known Scrin biology. Injuries in the wounded beast's bulbous upper body, still leaking that silver blood-slurry; the gemstone eyes; the soft connecting tissue between the upper body and leg sections. He picked the latter, lined up his target, and went still as humans scattered in all directions, maneuvering and firing and taking cover.

He squeezed the trigger. The rifle kicked. His shot was dead on.

And it burst against the Battlemind's kinetic barrier to no effect, just like hundreds of other bullets were doing at that same moment.

"Right, magic Scrin technology," he grunted, and made a couple of adjustments to his weapon's ammunition settings. Flip a switch, eject existing mod. Insert alternate mod for phasic ammunition. Flip. Three clicks: one to confirm upload of mod, second to confirm mod installation, third to confirm rifle will fire with mod.

He sighted the Battlemind again. The target danced around in his scope as biotic pulses hammered it from Shepard, Alenko, Taylor, and maybe a couple of other biotics. Those seemed to be the only things that bypassed the shields completely. Not even the crackling bursts of sonic grenades were penetrating the giant alien's barriers. Lightning surged around the alien's back again, and it launched another kinetic strike as Garrus found his target. Bodies went flying, and screams sounded. A couple of aircars went tumbling. Nothing on the scale of what it had done earlier in the assault.

It was getting weaker. Maybe it was running out of power, or all these wounds it was suffering and the constant pounding were draining it. Either way, it was good news for him.

Garrus went still, sighted his target, and the rifle _thoomed_ again.

This time, he saw a burst of silver blood, and his mandibles clicked in satisfaction.

"All personnel," he called over his radio as he pumped the handle on the rifle, cycling the internal heat magazine. "Its shields cannot block phasic ammunition. Switch 'em if you've got 'em."

He brought the rifle up toward the thrashing, pained Battlemind, and caught all of those gleaming crystalline eyes through his carbine's scope as they oriented toward him.

_Huh._ Garrus thought, as a small spike of terror lanced through him. Just a small one.

He squeezed the trigger anyway, and was rewarded with the shattering of one of those faceted eyes and a beautiful splatter of silver blood, right before the wave of force crashed across the wide bay and sent him flying.

* * *

Cars crashed with sharp metallic scrapes and bangs, Werewolves blazed with half a dozen different types of modules, and men and women screamed and shouted all around Shepard as she dash-stumbled across the bay, ducking under another flying car. The Battlemind was advancing across the hangar, smashing a swathe through vehicles and GDI troops alike in its hunt for Tali.

Tracer fire from dozens of guns intersected on the Battlemind, and she saw rounds managing to get through the barriers - either it was weakening or they were using phasic ammo. Havoc was bellowing orders, while Udina was taking cover beside a heavy car, doing something with his omnitool.

Shepard also caught glimpses of the rest of her group. She saw Garrus go flying, even as he spat in the thing's eye - metaphorically, as he did a hell of a lot more than just _spit_. She saw him land and roll awkwardly, kinetic barriers flaring to cushion his fall. She spotted Doctor Michel tending to another injured Marine. She saw a car go flying toward a group of civilians, only to slow in midair from a biotic pull, and then get launched away when Kaidan ran past and punched it out of the way with both arms. She saw Tali taking cover, shotgun in hand, her body language tense and angry that she couldn't join in the battle.

Shepard ran toward the Battlemind, climbing up and jumping off of an overturned car, and once again focused as much power as she could dark energy swirling around and coalescing together at her fingertips. She punched out, sending a tremendous bolt of dark energy into the Battlemind's flank, and the blast of altered gravity sent it toppling over.

"Come on, you B-movie reject!" she shouted, readying another burst of dark energy. The Battlemind struggle to its feet, and she hurled another biotic shove into it, sending it back off its feet. "You couldn't kill me on Akuze!" She blasted it again as it stood, making the monster stumble. Dizziness hit her, but she grit her teeth and pushed through it.

This wasn't the time to let her body give out. She punched the monster again with another biotic impact. The more she kept it off-balance, the more the rest of the troops in the bay could regroup and hit the monster with everything they had. Even these absurdly durable Scrin had to die at some point.

"You can't kill me!" Maybe it was the stims. Maybe it was the buildup of stress over multiple firefights over this long, terrible day. Maybe it was just pure rage at the ugly memories that things like this monster had left on her. But for whatever reason, Shepard didn't care about her own safety. She just wanted the fucking Battlemind _dead_.

She punched it again with another snarling biotic blast, but this impact just made it flinch. A deep, resonant howl sounded across the bay, and Shepard had the distinct feeling that this creature was now targeting her, specifically. Lightning surged around its back as it turned, focusing attention on her specifically, those gemstone eyes locking onto her and bringing the full weight of its alien fury down on the human female hammering it.

Loosing a wordless scream, Shepard struck once more, dead center in the Battlemind's face. The bolt of dark energy hit just as it cut loose, impacting it the Scrin warrior's face and shattering every crystalline eye. It was rocked back several steps, the howl of victory turning into a cry of pain.

Then the kinetic blast hit Shepard dead on, and then she was airborne, tumbling, spinning.

Descending.

Something hit her in the back, blasting the air out of her lungs. She heard and _felt _the crack running through her back as her armor broke, and a brief moment of incredible pain.

Shepard lay still for a moment, wondering why the ceiling was covered in bodies and fire and crumpled air cars, and could hear her blood rushing through her ears. She eventually realized she was hanging upside down from something, and couldn't really tell because there was no feeling below her upper torso.

A red warning message flickered across her HUD. Something about biometrics. Something about her spine. And then something about her heart.

Then nothing.

* * *

Tali saw Shepard fall, and found herself standing, a war of emotions screaming through her as she shouted the human's name.

First her companions - her _friends_ - from the Fleet. Then Kal'Reegar. Now Shepard.

Tali'Zorah vas Neema shouldered her shotgun and sighted the Battlemind. The data didn't matter. The war didn't matter. Not even the Fleet mattered.

She didn't have anything pithy to say as she ran across the bay toward the Battlemind. Tali only knew that she wanted the damn thing _dead_. Gunfire was pouring in from every direction, and the monster was bleeding, wounded, maybe dying. And as her shotgun pounded against her shoulder, Tali added to the fire tearing the Scrin monster apart.

It turned wildly, silver blood pouring from its body, but lightning flashed over its back and blasts of kinetic force rippled out left and right. It pivoted toward her and fired a shot in her general direction, hurling crumpled aircars and bodies at her. Tali dove to the ground, sliding along the flat metal floor of the hangar. Her barriers flared as debris skipped off them at the same speed as bullet, and vehicles crashed down around her.

She rose, not ten meters from the massive beast, and raised her shotgun. The Werewolf beat against her shoulder, slugs impacting the Battlemind's barriers. Some were stopped dead. Some cut clean through.

The weapon overheated, and she dropped the Werewolf before dragging out her pistol. It unfolded in her hands, and as she raised it, her radio crackled.

"Ma'am, please take cover."

Her finger rested on the trigger, but she was too shocked to fire. It took her a heartbeat to comprehend what she just heard, but then Tali rose and dove behind a battered, half-flattened aircar.

Kal'Reegar had finally caught up to the battle, and he joined it with the kingly roar of a MAWS as he strode through the hole it had punched in the wall.

Railgun rounds bit into the Battlemind's barriers - barriers that had before repelled the rounds with ease but now only slowed them down. Silver blood exploded from crumpled armor plates, and the beast whirled, sounding more cries of synthetic agony. Kal strode forward, firing the enormous MAWS on cyclic fire, driving the Battlemind backwards.

It didn't take the abuse sitting down. More electricity arced over its body, and the Scrin fired another kinetic blast in Kal'Reegar's general direction. He saw the strike coming and skittered sideways as fast as he could, diving out of the direct line of the blast. The kinetic burst was weaker this time, and he was only sent rolling across the deck, bouncing a couple of times.

Garrus took that opportunity to shoot out one of the Battlemind's legs, and it toppled sideway. Tali rose, firing her pistol. Biotic thrusts hit the Scrin warrior from multiple directions as Kaidan and Jacob joined in. The creature tried to stand, lightning surging across its back in preparation for another blast.

Then the horn of an enormous aircar sounded, and the howl of roaring engines filled the bay. The Battlemind turned toward the sound, just as a heavy-lift aircar shot across the bay like a tremendous battering ram and crashed into the Scrin head-on, smashing it and carrying it across the room. Both Scrin and aircar crashed into the far wall with a bone-shuddering impact that sent silvery gore splattering twenty meters in every direction. The heavy-lift aircar crashed down to deck with a deafening clatter, and the bay went silent.

Several GDI Marines started shouting and cheering, while Tali rose and hurried across the room toward Kal'Reegar. He waved as she approached.

"I'm okay, ma'am," he grunted, standing up. "Go check on Shepard."

Tali froze and then spun toward where she had seen Shepard fall. A hulking form in GDI armor - the mutant, Alenko, was hefting a much smaller, limp form, and setting her gently down on the deck.

* * *

"Garrus!" Havoc was shouting, running across the bay. He started laughing as he got closer to the crashed car. "You crazy bast-"

"Admiral, that wasn't me," Garrus said, and Havoc came to a halt. He glanced across the room and spotted Garrus, who stood atop a wrecked car, still holding his rifle. The turian shrugged. The Admiral turned back to the car, a question on his lips. He ran up to the door and wrenched it open.

A battered Donnel Udina stumbled out, cradling his left arm. Blood ran down the side of his head, but he seemed alert. Havoc caught him as he nearly toppled and helped him stand.

"Ambassador?" he asked, confused, and Udina choked out a laugh.

"I did not always work behind a desk, Admiral," he said with a grin. "Old spacer rule. Even if you're unarmed, you've still got your engines and the bow." He glanced to the dead Battlemind. "Applies just as well for aircraft, it would seem."

"Hell, yes, Ambassador," Havoc said with a grin. "Ram 'em 'till they die from it. I'm buying you a whole keg for this!"

* * *

Kaidan leaned over Shepard's body, his omnitool glowing as he accessed suit systems and began furiously working to apply medigel and keep her heart beating. She'd lost a lot of blood already, and from what the suit was telling him, her back was broken in several places. One chunk of shrapnel had split her left lung.

Doctor Michel was running toward them, medical case in hand.

"Casevac needed!" she was shouting into her radio. "I need emergency casevac for multiple class three injuries!"

Kaidan fought to keep Shepard alive as Michel reached them. He began detaching armor pieces to expose the undersuit. Something flashed in his HUD' biometrics display, but he refused to look at it. He knew the signal it was telling him all too well.

Shepard had flatlined, but he wasn't giving up on her. Not yet.

* * *

_**Codex - Non-Council Species - Scrin: Disintegrator**_

_The Disintegrator is the primary "infantry" model of Scrin infantry. These quadruped creatures follow a common Scrin design pattern, consisting of a lower body with long legs and a bulbous upper body where the primary cognition and life-sustaining organs/machinery are housed. Unlike _

_most Scrin designs, the Disintegrator has large, well-developed locomotive/musculature in the legs, akin to mammalian sprinting species, enabling the Disintegrator to move very quickly over open ground - a necessity when they must maintain pace with much larger and faster-moving Scrin units. The upper body of the Disintegrator is built around a large energy cannon, which takes up the majority of the upper body's mass. The cannon's power supply appears to be the main energy supply for the entire Disintegrator model. Disintegrator legs contain what are believed to be pressure-triggered charges that generate large bursts of plasma upon detonation, often powerful enough to cripple or destroy heavy tanks._

_Disintegrators serve primarily as short-range assault and anti-armor infantry, although models optimized for urban and room-to-room combat have been encountered. The versions fought in the Third Tiberium War were limited to anti-armor roles, proving relatively ineffective against GDI and Nod infantry, but the versions encountered on Akuze and under the control of Reaper-18 are far more versatile, often being able to scale walls and armed with plasma-spewing weapons akin to flamethrowers. The average Disintegrator is roughly the size of a very large dog or varren, typically coming to stomach height of the average human, and massing similarly. Variants have been encountered that are larger or small; at the largest they are as tall as a human at the shoulder with about three times the mass, while at the smallest they come up to just under waist height._

_Disintegrators behave in a manner akin to wolves or other pack-based predators. They have limited cognition and minimal tactical ability on their own, relying on more intelligent Scrin to command them in battle. On the other hand, Disintegrators have an even greater fearlessness than their more intelligent kin, often charging underneath tank treads or serving as shields for other Scrin units in battle._

_**Codex - Non-Council Species - Scrin: Ravager**_

_The Ravager is a Scrin heavy assault "infantry" model optimized for medium-range combat against light armor, power armor, and light infantry. Ravagers possess the standard Scrin design of a large upper body supported by a lower body and attached legs. The Ravager's legs very long and often outfitted with biological/mechanical boosters that enable greater agility and speed. The Ravager's primary weapon system is a short "cannon" built into the main upper body that fires long spears of specially-processed Tiberium. The "ammunition" for these tiberium spikes grows out of the back of the Ravager's upper body; when the time comes to fire, sections of these tiberium growths are shaved off, shaped into spears, and fired in a manner not unlike the ammunition blocks of mass accelerators._

_The Ravager's spike-like projectiles impact with tremendous force, often more than enough to penetrate vehicle or powered armor. The spikes often overpenetrate enough that they can "stake" a target to a nearby wall or against the ground. Even if the initial impact is not lethal, the target is often immobilized enough that a followup shot can finish the job._

_The Ravagers encountered during the Third Tiberium War were few in number and limited to the smaller operations handled by the Reaper and Traveler sects. The Reaper-18 forces responsible for more recent conflicts have been noted to make use of far more Ravagers than other Scrin sects, and share Reaper-18's ubiquitous durability and viciousness._

* * *

**_Author's__ Notes:_**This chapter turned out shorter than I expected. certainly shorter than the previous one. I once again followed my usual idiom of only doing maybe a third of the chapter, leaving it alone for a while, and then pounded out the rest in a single fit of manic inspiration.

With this chapter, we finally see the end of the action-oriented arc on the Citadel. Next chapter should see the winddown from all this violence, and the next arc of the story will begin soon enough.

Until next chapter . . . .


	14. Interlude: Ghosts

_**Interlude: Ghosts**_

_A black sky stretched overhead, shapes twisting and roiling and clawing among clouds of ash and vapor. Heat washed over her as she stumbled across the field, pain arching up her feet in jagged spikes. Something heavy and solid rested in her fingers, and she glanced down. A Werewolf rifle in her hands, battered and rusted, the computer readouts fuzzy and flickering. Below the rifle she could see herself: her armor bloody and shattered in places, her feet bare and blackened from heat. Blood ran down her legs and spilled upon the dark soil._

_Spikes of smooth, glassy green crystal jabbed out of the ground all around her. Shards of it were slicing into the soles of her feet. Black veins of rot and infection cut though her feet and lower legs._

_Thunder rolled overhead, and she looked up at the black sky. Lightning arced above, pulsing from the shapes that wheeled through the clouds. She spotted flickers of solid forms, covered in chitin plates or dark spines._

_Her gaze shifted back down to the rolling plains around her. The glassy crystals spread in every direction, a sickly green glow rising over the ground, and dark shapes shambled among the growths, all lean and humanoid._

_She stumbled forward, moving to the nearest one with unsteady steps. Every movement of her feet hurt, but the sharp biting agony flowed together into a steady beat of pain. She pushed on, her teeth grit together, jaw locked into a tight grimace. Ragged breaths escaped her as she drew closer to one of the moving figures. She tried to call out to them, but a dry, exhausted rasp was all she could manage._

_It must have heard her anyway, for it twisted around to face her, and a face that long ago might have been human stared at her. Green spikes jutted from its eye sockets, and its skin was a corpse-pallor of blue-white. Tubes and circuits of bright, pulsing green ran through the nearly-naked body's skin and muscles, concentrated at more green crystalline spikes bursting from its skin. Claws half a meter in length stretched from the thing's fingers and forearms, gleaming in the dim light._

_She slid to a halt, feet cutting against the field of crystal spikes, and brought the battered Werewolf up. The creature peered toward her with those spike-eyes for agonizing seconds, before its mouth opened and a rattling wail escaped its lips. She heard pain and confusion in the mechanical cry, and the Werewolf wavered in her fingers. The creature stared for a moment at her as the cry died away, and then both blade-covered arms rose toward the sky._

_She heard a shuddering scream overhead, a deep, bone-shaking sound that sent her down to her knees. Crystal blades jabbed into her legs as she fell, drawing fresh blood. She looked up, in time to see a massive shape, an aquatic form of black metal wreathed in red lightning, descending from the ashen clouds. Beams of blue-white energy slashed down into the shape as it descended, from the spiked shapes lurking in the clouds, but they boiled off its hull to little effect._

_The long appendages on its bow stretched out, energy gathering along the vast limbs, and searing red fire began to rain down on the field of crystal._

_The husk lunged toward her as the columns of destruction struck the ground, and it grabbed her shoulders. The blades slashed into her skin, but there was no pain - just a frigid chill that locked her in place. Her flesh began to part and twist, solid shapes biting into her skin and pushing deep, digging through muscle and blood vessels and bone. The spike eyes of the once-human met hers, and it tried to say something. All she heard over the pounding, searing fire cutting through the field of crystal was a dry rattle._

_Scarlet heat swept toward them, and the husk burst into flames and instant before the fire burned her to ash._

* * *

Large, dark eyes flicked back and forth across the interior of the orbital docking station, taking in a thousand details and cataloguing them with speed that would have been impossible for an unaugmented human mind. The salarian walking down the dark hallway possessed a sharp mind, but not a scientific one. He sought and analyzed details for two reasons only: to forward them to policy-makers, and to give him a proper means to track and/or inflict violence as needed.

Being a Citadel Spectre, Jondum Bau was an expert regarding nearly every form of the latter. More importantly, he was going to be the first Citadel intelligence asset to set foot on a Brotherhood warship. Or at least, a _true_ Brotherhood warship.

The hallway they walked through was emblematic of the Brotherhood's design philosophy: long, made of dark metals, with the dominant lighting being shades or warm colors, predominantly red. Holographic interfaces were scattered at regular intervals on one side of the corridor, and the other consisted of armorglass viewports showing the blue and brown patches of the planet the station orbited below, and the jet-black, curving blade of the dagger-shaped Nod warship above. It was a far more elegant and sinister design compared with the blocky, blunt, and looming GDI designs he was familiar with. That also made for more delicate hull designs. Possible exploitation point; would require more detailed analysis of hull composition and layout of internal systems.

The Spectre kept one flicking eye on his minders, a pair of black-armored warrior priests of the Black Hand sect, but the Brotherhood soldiers' pace and body language told him that they were mostly there to guide him to the cruiser. _Mostly_, though. He had no illusions.

They passed through an airlock and into a decontamination chamber, and Bau waited patiently as the decon fields scanned them and sterilized the air around the group. It was a good opportunity to observe Nod's processes for wiping both biological and technological infectors; after all, the decon chamber was the logical first step in removing any listening devices or other unwelcome objects on guests. He noted that the decon field wiped most of his own test-bugs, save for three with a particular composition of ceramic/plastic coating. Definite exploitation point.

They passed through a few moments later, Bau carrying a great deal of interesting observations with him, and started through the corridors of the Nod ship. The red light was harsher here, and there was an inexplicable mist hovering at just over ankle level that made seeing the floor difficult. Bau had no idea of its purpose, beyond making him step more carefully. Despite the distracting mist, he continued taking notes: Bridge and CIC in one room. The captain's chair on a raised platform overlooking multiple command holograms. Two sets of six crewmember workstations, surrounding the command chair and CIC in a long, narrow double semicircle. Similar to turian design. Fewer than comparative Citadel or GDI designs, indicative of more reliance on networked EVA units. Possible exploitation point.

The bridge was fully manned with about fifteen people, most human, but a couple of asari and one batarian, all wearing close-fitting black uniforms. The captain was a tall, lean human clad in the matte black uniform of Nod's naval officers, devoid of rank insignia or medals save for patches on the upper arms indicating his rank and a beret. A short black goatee and mustache, neatly trimmed, adorned his face. He descended from the command platform and approached with a smile and an extended hand, which Bau shook.

"Spectre Jondum Bau, I presume," he said as they shook. "Captain Aldis Rawne. Welcome aboard the _BNS Venice._"

"Honored," Bau replied. He limited eye movements while speaking to be polite. "How long until we launch."

"Seconds, Spectre," Rawne replied, and he glanced up. A moment later a quiet shudder ran through the ship. "And we're detached. EVA, plot us a course to the incident site."

"_Course prepared, Captain,"_ a deep male voice responded._ "Transition in six minutes."_

"Excellent," Rawne replied, and looked back to Bau. "I assume you've been fully briefed on the situation?"

"The Spectre office has forwarded STG reports on the incidents, yes," Bau replied. "I had to cut through some of the bureaucracy, but that was not too difficult for one with my clearance."

Bau was understating the situation. Two weeks had passed between the attack on the Citadel and now, and within hours of the first shots he had received direct orders from Councilor Valern himself. Bau and several other Spectres - including Spectres Kyrik, Octavian, Krios, and Vasir - had been reassigned to investigate the Scrin threat. Information-sharing between GDI's InOps and the Citadel's intelligence agencies had grown several times over, and general communication between the two factions had greatly increased. No more Scrin attacks had occurred, but reports of geth incursions and minor raids had increased. Two small GDI bases - one a research outpost studying stellar phenomena and the other a supply outpost for long-range patrols - had stopped reporting in, and reports of geth ships deeper in GDI space were also being responded to.

And as Bau had started his investigation, his sources within the Brotherhood and the Terminus relayed worrying rumors about the previous attacks on Nod colonies. A few deeper inquiries led to some hastily-exchanged messages, followed by direct contact between a Brotherhood agent and Bau himself. Nod wanted a trustworthy Citadel agent to assist with their investigation, which was a major concession that had _quite _a few people talking back on the Citadel.

A week later, Jondum Bau was responding to the Brotherhood's request, and not a moment too soon. He'd gotten word of another incursion mere hours before the scheduled meeting, and their plans had changed rather abruptly..

"Then we have no need to waste any further time," Rawne said, starting back toward his command chair. "I'll have my second show you to you quarters and forward you any intel we get from the site before the jump."

One of the officers approached Bau to lead him to his quarters, and he hid his frown. The Nod officer was forceful, dismissive. Maybe even arrogant. Possible exploitation point.

* * *

_Lightning slashed down across the remnants of the colony. Modules lay broken and half-molten. The charred remains of bodies, some in armor and some in settler fatigues, were scattered everywhere. Nothing moved save the spined forms of hulking, crystalline quasi-insects, their hides gleaming and reflecting the orange light of fires and flickering silver of electricity lancing through the black skies overhead. Alien warbles and low, electronic howls sounded as they stalked through the colony._

_She crouched low, breathing hard from exhaustion and pain, blood seeping through the bandages wrapping the remains of her face. She was out of medigel to seal the wounds properly, and the painkillers had run out long ago. Her Werewolf trembled in her hands, and she pressed against a low wall that remained from one of the destroyed habitats, listening with terrified attention. _

_Dull detonations sounded, a few kilometers away. She could see the distant shapes of tumbling, flaming wreckage from the orbitals as they fell, far away._

_She waited, checking the radar indicator on the visor over her left eye. The faint radiation and movement markers of the Scrin beyond maneuvered around her hideout. One drifted closer, and she shrank down, pressing herself against the wall. A Disintegrator loped along the opposite side of the low wall, scratching along on the pavement, cannon-head sweeping back and forth._

_It paused close to her position, going still, and her heart leapt into her chest. She raised the Werewolf, knowing that if she fired, she would be dead in moments when the rest of the aliens responded. How she'd survived this long was a mystery to her._

_She waited, muscles tense and trembling, as the Scrin peered through the rubble. The cannon-head twitched once. Twice. Then it turned away, and the alien scampered away like a curious dog, leaving her alone. _

_She lowered the weapon, relaxing._

_A hand fell on her shoulder, and she jerked, nearly screaming in pure reflex. She spun, bringing up the Werewolf while lurching away._

_She found her sights on a figure swathed in a cloak of dark metal plates, the edges gleaming in the dim light. A hood shrouded the figure's face, but hands with flesh the color of a pallid, green corpse extended from wide, flaring sleeves. Green and black circuitry ran along the back of those hands, one of which was clasped firmly on her shoulder, and the other gripping something that gleamed with a sudden, fierce golden light._

_She almost pulled the trigger, but the light caught her eye. She looked down at the figure's hand, and it opened, to reveal a shining ball of shimmering light, thousands upon millions upon billions of specks of data and symbols swirling among its surface like an entire desert's worth of sand trapped in a man's hand. _

_Hands that, she abruptly realized, had fewer fingers than a human's._

_Before she could figure out what that meant, the glowing sphere of data expanded and stretched, spreading over the cloaked figure's fingers like tremendous claws made of golden data. The arm shot forward toward her forehead in an eyeblink, plunging into her skull._

_The hood shifted, and before the glowing light consumed her, she caught a glimpse of two sets of golden eyes, irises shaped like horizontal hourglasses._

* * *

It took a full day at cruising speed for the _BNS Venice _to reach the Nod colony of Eskirk. They transitioned from faster-than-light to slower-than-light only a light-second out from the colony. Sensors picked up nothing moving - or at least, nothing moving that wasn't supposed to be in constant motion. They did, however, pick up a lot of debris. No signals came from the surface of the planet save residual heat patterns from the colony's urbanized area.

"Colony had three frigates and a cruiser on-station when the distress call came in," Captain Rawne reported as he and Bau stared at the command holograms in the CIC depicting the orbital debris fields. Bau ran the numbers in his head.

"Debris is consistent with those tonnage classes," the salarian said. "Residual heat indicates a thermal weapons system of some kind. Energy, or maybe ferrokinetic like the one used at Eden Prime."

Rawne nodded, a grim set to his face, and issued orders for a ground team deployment. Bau joined the Nod soldiers, and Rawne reluctantly agreed. A Spectre's expertise was no help if he stayed where his only source of data was long-range sensor readings.

The dropships descending toward the surface carried two squads each. They were small, lightly armored, fast, and dependent on shields and cloaking systems to protect them. Possible exploitation point.

Bau sat with the Nod soldiers, who were all clad in tight-fitting matte black ballistic weave hardsuits and helmets with dark red visors, and armed with assault weapons very similar to

GDI Werewolves. Suspiciously similar, save for the different types of modules. Though he couldn't see their faces, Bau noted the tension in their postures as they descended through the atmosphere.

The pilot's voice filtered in over the craft's internal comm channels, reporting their heading and the local weather conditions. They would be landing in the middle of the day, local time, in good weather. Both of those facts bothered Bau more than a little; bad local weather was always the best time for insertion into hostile territory. The Nod soldiers seemed more confident about their drop conditions, though not arrogant or dismissive like Rawne had been. Bau suspected that these men and women had seen a lot more action than they let on.

Bau identified the channel for the platoon leader, a Captain Hue, and opened it.

"Were any survivors found at the previous sites?" he asked. The officer shook his head.

"None," he replied. "The attackers were thorough."

"Do you suspect we will find anything different this time?"

"I hope that we will," grunted the human. "They're not infallible, whoever they are. They'll make a mistake."

"Indeed," Bau said with a nod, but was not certain himself. If the geth were responsible - evidence hinted as much - then there was a chance that they wouldn't make the same errors an organic would.

"According to the reports," Bau added, "Every one of these incident sites suffered attacks from geth ships within three weeks of the second attack."

"Not all of them," Hue replied. "Two were hit without any warning."

Interesting. So the attackers were able to bypass Nod security without a preliminary attack to weaken the defenses. That dashed his theory that the geth were using the initial attacks to disguise troop drops.

"Landing in two minutes," reported the pilot, which cut into his thoughts. Everyone on the dropship began double-checking their weapons. The hiss and click of shapeshifter modules cycling through their weapons filled the cabin. Tension grew as the moments passed, and the soldiers rose from their seats at the one-minute mark. Bau joined them, submachinegun in hand.

There was a roar of thrusters, the brief, nausea-inducing surge of a mass effect field firing up quickly to slow their descent, and a few seconds later the dropship touched down and dull thunk of metal on concrete.

The doors opened, bright midday light spilling into the cabin, and they poured out to retake the silent, dead colony.

* * *

_The pitch-black sky roiled and twisted, silver lightning and red lines cutting back and forth. The land shook, the battered, tiberium-covered ruins of Akuze's colony rumbling and shivering as debris rained down from the sky. Monsters of machine and crystal did battle in the skies beyond sight, not caring for the world they fought above._

_None of that mattered to her as she held down the trigger on her Werewolf, firing on full auto, her back pressed against a cracked colony module's wall. She screamed in terror and desperation, the sound lost in the rapid-fire thunder of her rifle as it loosed a stretched-out, mechanical howl of hyperveloctiy rounds._

_The swarm of Buzzers sweeping toward her cared nothing for the sound and fury either._

_They swept through her bullets, not caring for those the hail of fire cut down - too few to make a difference. Razor-edged threads slashed toward her down the street with deadly intent. She frantically triggered the grenade launcher module. The launcher emerged, locked into place, and she pulled the trigger._

_An empty click answered her._

_She blinked, and a single thought flicked through her - _that wasn't what had happened -_ and then the Buzzers fell upon her._

_Gossamer blades etched across plates, cutting with mindless ferocity against the armor. She thrashed and screamed, swinging her rifle back and forth, batting away some of the razor-threads and smashing others to fragments. But the swarm cared little, and within an instant they had begun cutting into the softer ballistic fabric under and between the plates, slicing through synthetic muscle and superconducting circuitry to reach the human underneath._

_Then pain._

_They plunged into her skin, spinning and slashing blades, first cutting into the meat of her left bicep with cold, wriggling burst of agony. She could feel the bones of her arm cracking and breaking, the tendons snapping apart, the slithering bursts of white-cold pain as they worked their way up her arm. Sparks of that frigid fire erupted in her legs, arcing across her stomach, and in the back of her head as the Buzzers tore through her armor._

_She fell, blood running through a hundred rents in her armor, and tried to scream. Only splatters of crimson emerged from her mouth, grotesquely bright in the dim light of the destroyed colony. She could see coils of crystalline thread bursting from the ballistic fabric over her throat, before diving back in, and one sliced its way out of her nose, slithering across her face._

_She fell to the pavement, rolling onto her back, hundreds of the bladed threads slicing her boy to ribbons around her. Yet despite the pain, her mind kept working, and it asked a desperate question: Why wasn't she dead yet?_

_The black clouds still thundered and flashed with the battle between alien forces far overhead, but somewhere in the clouds, a shimmering, gold-white light began to form. It wasn't a star, because stars weren't made of sandstorms of symbols and images whirling about in a sphere. _

_A voice murmured, audible over her own muffled, choking gasps of pain. It spoke in an alien language, maddeningly familiar, but somehow beyond her ability to comprehend._

_A figure in armor, nearly black in the dim light, stepped up beside her. Gleaming golden eyes peered at her from beneath a helmet covering a broad, almost aquatic skull. It pointed toward the glowing sphere overhead._

_It was a Tacitus, she realized. No, it was _the_ Tacitus. The swirling lights and symbols and script were the ones she'd seen on Eden Prime._

_Eden Prime? But she was on Akuze, and-_

_The golden-eyes alien bent down, piercing her with those four sharp, glittering hourglass orbs, and pointed more insistently at the Tacitus in the skies above. The pain from the Buzzers was a distant echo, even as they savaged what was left of her body._

_The clouds parted, and she could see a tremendous shape of jagged crystal descending: a Scrin colony ship. White lightning erupted from it in sheets, slashing back and forth with the red beams from a ship of the same design as the one on Eden Prime._

_And above them, barely visible in the twisting clouds, a humanoid shape in a dark cloak. She saw black eyes within the cloak, and one arm was a jagged, crystalline Scrin limb, and the other one of the dark metal appendages of the great warship._

_The armored alien reached down, grabbing the bloody remains of her head, and the hissing, incomprehensible language intensified. The Buzzers rose from her body and began attacking it, but the alien cared little, instead leaning close until all she could see were the four glowing eyes. She tried to speak though ruined vocal cords, to tell it that she didn't understand, but then an echo sounded over the language, and a concept - not a word, but the idea itself, transcending language - cut through her brain, superimposing itself over the black-eyed figure._

_**ENEMY**_

_Then merciful nothing._

* * *

Jondum Bau peered across the empty habitat module, a frown on his face as his eyes flicked around the home and taking in details. Midday sunlight streamed in from a couple of large open windows to the right, illuminating a mid-sized room that was partitioned off into a dining and sleeping area. Metal trays with cold food sat on the table, one tipped over. Two of the chairs had fallen over, positioning consistent with someone leaping up in a panic. There was a single bullet hole near one of the windows. He scanned the habitat for the weapon that had created the hole, but there was no sign of it.

He nodded, biting back his frustration. Whoever had attacked Eskirk had taken pains to wipe or remove any recording devices they could find. And they had left no corpses or easily-identifiable genetic material, and that bullet hole in the wall was one of the only signs of conflict in the colony as a whole. The _Venice's_ troop complement had swept most of the city and found no survivors either.

Bau stood and exited the habitat, stepping back into the open air. Eskirk's main colony had been set up on a hilltop overlooking a wide forested valley. It wasn't as warm as Sur'kesh, but the environment was welcoming regardless. It would have been pleasant, if not for the dead colony they were searching for clues. A pair of Venom gunships circled the perimeter of the colony, and black-armored drones flitted back and forth over the colony. He could also see the black-armored Brotherhood soldiers moving through the gray and white, cylindrical prefab housing modules that made up most of the colony. Their postures had shifted from initial wariness to bored watchfulness as crisis response had turned into crisis cleanup, especially with very little to clean up anyway.

"Captain Hue, this is Bau," he called over the radio. "Nothing on this end."

"Copy that," Hue responded. "My techs have finished going over the colony's mainframes. Someone wiped them pretty thoroughly."

"We can probably reconstruct the data, given enough time," Bau replied as he crossed the street outside the habitat complex.

"They wiped it with a flamethrower," Hue grunted.

"Thorough," Bau replied. "Respectable, if they weren't so clearly threatening." Bau glanced around the colony as he walked. "I've gone over the sites of interest you marked, and I've concluded that this was neither geth nor Scrin."

"Agreed," Hue said. "Geth would have left some trace behind, and the damage isn't severe enough for Scrin. They've never launched an attack with this little collateral damage."

"No traces of Scrin radiation markers or tiberium fragments, even microscopic," Bau added. The Citadel had snatched up every bit of tiberium they could from the Scrin bodies in the Citadel, and had forwarded the data to him at his request. Too bad it was all of the "inert" variant that was singularly useless for manufacturing. He could only imagine GDI's amusement at that.

"We're going to continue sweeping and start sending drones out into the wilderness around the colony," Hue said. "I'll keep you posted."

Bau closed the line and made his way across the colony, passing through an industrial base and what had once been the colony's garrison, a medium-sized complex built like a bunker with a stylized metal hand emerging from the rooftop that held a wireframe replica of Earth. Brotherhood troops were still crawling over the latter. There was an anxiousness to their search patterns, which he understood. They were ready for signs of violence and ruin, and to retake the colony from an enemy force. The bare, empty colony, which looked like everyone had simply stood up and left without a word was far more disconcerting. Bau didn't find it off-putting now, but it had been quite troubling in the first couple of hours he'd been there. By now he had dealt with it and was focused on finding what he needed to identify the attackers and bring them down.

A few questions to the Brotherhood soldiers at the garrison showed they had found nothing beyond confirmation as to the thoroughness of the attackers. He departed the facility, and as he emerged into the sunlight his radio chirped.

"Bau," he grunted.

"This is Hue," the captain reported. "We've got something."

* * *

The western end of the colony had been given over to expanded construction on habitats, with the buildings being heavier and more permanent than the modules on the other end of the colony. Hue led Bau through several half-finished buildings to a lot on the edge of the colony.

There, surrounded by several Brotherhood soldiers, lay a corpse.

It was nothing but metal plates and bits of cybernetic components, but it was more than they had seen so far. Bau activated his omnitool and scanned the remains as they approached, and kept his face a careful mask as the response came back from this onboard database.

These were the non-integrated remnants of one of the Marked of Kane. Ninety-two-percent probability that they were fifth-generation, implemented in 2177.

"Interesting," Bau said. "Cybernetic components, but I don't recognize the model."

Hue nodded, taking the lie at face value. Bau didn't see any reason to advertise the Citadel's knowledge of Kane's personal cyborg enforcers.

"Looks like a trooper's modules," he lied in turn. "Probably repurposed prosthetics. My men picked up a short-range reply burst while they were sending active comms pulses. Hoped we'd find some automatic response system. Got lucky."

"Luck would be if the remains contain any useful data beyond automated emergency response protocols," Bau said. Hue shrugged.

"Take what you can get, you know?" he said, and looked to the engineers. One of them gingerly turned over a wide, curving plate - Bau's scanners identified it as part of the plates that would cover the spine - and opened a small compartment inside of it. He removed a thin spike of crystal: an optical storage device.

Hue took it and inserted it into his omnitool's reader. A couple of taps of the omnitool's keys created a holographic projection hovering over his hand. Bau stepped closer as Hue worked.

"It's a recording," the Brotherhood officer said. "With attached video and audio files. Starting initial record now."

The projection shifted to show a blank black image. A male human voice with low, clipped tones spoke.

"_This is Alpha-One-One-Three-Three-Kilo-Six, and this is my final testament. Prior to my ascension, I was Major Barry Unger, Brotherhood Marines. I have been assigned to the Brotherhood colony of Eskirk, in the Minotaur system within the Hourglass Nebula. Within the last month, a number of Brotherhood and independent human colonies have gone silent. Rescuers have discovered empty colonies, and patrols and search detachments have been unable to find any sign of the missing colonists. My orders are to stand watch at a Brotherhood colony fitting the profile of the attack and provide intelligence to followup investigations units - posthumously if necessary."_

"You will be remembered," Hue murmured, which was echoed by the other soldiers listening to the message.

"_The attack on the colony occurred at 1435 hours on July 9, 2183," _Unger's voice continued._ "All colonists have been killed or captured. If you are listening to this recording, then you have recovered my remains after I have self-terminated and explosively scattered my remains to prevent enemy capture or denial. I have attached all sensory recordings from my observation of the attack, including to the moment before self-termination while under enemy attack. May this information serve to protect our people. Peace through power, through the will of Kane."_

"How could he have recorded this?" Bau asked as the message ended. "The message was far too calm to be left while under attack."

"Mind-impulse," Hue said. "We're not listening to audio recordings. This is a direct mental data feed. We're literally listening to his last thoughts."

"Impressive discipline," Bau mused.

"Beyond human," Hue replied. "He ascended beyond mere human limitations." The Brotherhood soldier sighed. "A true son of Kane has been lost."

"What of his data?" Bau asked, and Hue nodded. His fingers flicked over his haptic interface, and he began navigating through file directories. He opened the first video file he found.

It wasn't long, but it was a clear video of a pair of creatures moving down one of the colony's streets.

"I've never seen anything like this," Hue murmured.

"I have, though only at a distance," Bau replied, staring hard at the images.

The creatures were tall, slender, insectile creatures, but completely unlike the Scrin. Where the Scrin had bodies of crystal and black flesh, these creatures had bodies of dull brown chitin, with four large, glowing yellow eyes set into a wide, flattened head. They wore no clothing, instead clad in that brown chitin, and wielded long, organic-looking weapons. The air around them had a reddish-gold blurring effect that swirled faintly; some kind of mass effect field red-shifting the light passing them, Bau guessed.

And all of that, especially the latter detail, added up to a clear, and terrifying picture.

"Those are Collectors," Bau murmured.

* * *

The faintest echo of sound, muffled and distant, rang in her ear. She twitched at sensation, at familiar voices. Human voices - male and female. A flanged male voice - turian. A modulated, filtered female voice - quarian.

She twitched again, and felt something click. She thought she heard a whirring sound, close by. The volume of the voices grew louder, clearer, through the thick gauze around her consciousness. She struggled through it, and a dry, rattling snarl escaped her throat.

Someone touched her hand - the right one, gentle and warm, and that pushed her even harder. She fought up to the surface, pushing through the gauzy numbness and muffled noise.

White light spilled over her, sharp and sudden, and for the first time in three weeks, Commander Shepard opened her eyes.

* * *

**_Author's Notes:_**I was arguing with myself over how trippy I wanted Shepard's dream sequences to be in this interlude. I eventually hit on a medium between incomprehensible and structured, as I figured that a combination of unconsciousness and Tacticus/Prothean mindfuckery would lend the dreams a mostly horrifying sense of familiarity.

Beyond that, I wanted to show what else is going on in the galaxy Bau's little adventure with the Brotherhood was a good device to show what's happening elsewhere, and what, precisely, the Brotherhood of Nod is doing out on the fringes of their own territory in the Terminus.

This chapter does bring an end to this particular act of the story, and we'll be moving further along later, with Shepard and Co getting the Normandy and taking the fight to the many, many enemies running amok in the galaxy.

Until next chapter . . . .


	15. Chapter 14: Mechanical Men

_**Chapter Fourteen: Mechanical Men**_

The planet had been named Horizon by the first human explorers to discover it within the Iera system, deep within the Shadow Sea cluster in the Attican Traverse. Horizon was notable for being an excellent world for human habitation, akin to Eden Prime in its suitable nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere and levo-amino life. Those settlers had been tremendously lucky to find it, at least according to the official story.

The truth was known to far fewer: those explorers had been following much older probe data sent out a long time ago that guided them to an ideal garden world. Those settlers had also held to a particular interpretation of the myriad Brotherhood of Nod religious sects, one which venerated Kane as an absolute prophet and ruler. The discovery of the garden world had drawn a tremendous number of followers, mostly human but with a not-insignificant number of non-human converts, including a surprisingly large number of vorcha. Horizon experienced an incredible, explosive growth that baffled some Citadel and GDI analysts, resulting in over forty million inhabitants, half of them human and a third of the remainder being vorcha - though this population was less than a fifth of the GDI-settled Terra Nova colony. The availability of human-derived rapid-fabrication and mass effect technology made assembling the cities on the surface and support facilities in the system relatively easy and quick, establishing a vibrant spiderweb of intra-system trade and development within thirty years.

Thus, when Kane had revealed himself as the leader of the Brotherhood of Nod, he already had a loyal world with many subjects to serve as his official capital, with an already-established infrastructure able to sustain a sizable defense fleet, offering the newly-revealed ruler personal legitimacy on top of that granted by his acknowledged place as the head of a major galactic faith.

Which was exactly as planned.

Horizon's orbit was filled with ships moving from the vast number of orbital platforms, a peculiarity of human settlement due to their homeworld's virulent nature. Many of Sol's teeming population were housed in orbital facilities, and after spending the better part of two centuries getting comfortable with orbital life - to the point that entire generations had never set foot on a planet's surface - humanity was comfortable with keeping large populations in space.

Despite this fact, a conspicuous section of Horizon's orbit was cleared of platforms and space traffic in general. The order to abandon this part of the planet's sky had come down an hour ago, with the consequences of disobedience ending in the word "lasers." Ships had scrambled to clear an area of a hundred thousand kilometers' radius before the deadline passed. This activity did not go unnoticed, as both GDI InOps agents monitoring the planet and a small group of a dozen automated salarian STG probes deposited in the system years ago were observing the unusual activity.

Reports of the activity were sent back with high priority, although they were lost in the shuffle of other high-priority communications. It turned out that a few days previously, the Citadel had been attacked by a relatively unknown species known as the Scrin, itself occurring days after another attack on a primary human colony world by a joint Scrin and geth force under the command of a rogue Citadel Spectre.

The reports garnered more attention when they sent back what happened seventeen seconds after the deadline had passed.

The Iera mass relay flared with electrical discharge, and something _massive_ burst through the relay, ending up less than seven thousand kilometers from the relay itself. Though dwarfed by the mass relay's own fifteen-kilometer length, the new arrival was larger than any known human vessel save for GDI's _Glacier_-class dreadnoughts and _Mars_-class supercarriers.

Before the STG observer probes near the relay could get a good look at the new arrival, a mass effect field surged up around it and the arrival jumped. Minutes later, it reappeared in a burst of Cherenkov radiation in the middle of the cleared zone over Horizon.

Everyone in the system observing the event, including those few Brotherhood personnel who had actually had known what to expect, paused to gape.

It wasn't a warship; though it had thrusters, they were of insufficient power to move it at speeds that would classify it as such. If it _had _been a warship, it would have been declared a violation of the Unified Human Armistice Treaty.

But the UHAT was much less precise when it came to _space stations._

The looming bulk orbiting over Horizon was two kilometers in length, as vast as a GDI supercarrier. The traditional Nod aesthetic ruled in its design: curving shapes coming to sharp tips and blade-like edges, glossy-black hull plating, and red illumination coming from portholes and crystalline structures stylized into the outward appearance of tremendous stained-glass windows. Function ruled in its design - for example, the great stained glass windows covered the most heavily armored hull sections of the station - but form was a close second. This was not a weapon of war.

It was a _temple. _Specifically, _the_ temple.

The station was crafted to resemble a great discus with a cluster of long, jagged central spires running through it perpendicular to the disc itself. Bright, glowing red blades branched off from the spires like tremendous fans or swords, with the narrow spears of docking ports or communications antennae stabbing out into the void. Tremendous sections of the station's disc were built of the same gleaming red crystal, shaped into forms that resembled the bloody stained glass windows that adorned Nod temples, causing the station to resemble a collection of jagged, glowing rubies set into obsidian.

An escort fleet of hundreds of small transports, twenty dagger-like Basilisk cruisers bristling with lasers and mass accelerators, and three times their number of needle-like frigates surrounded the vast station. Even without these craft - all of which matched UHAT limitations on tonnage to the letter - the temple-station's hull concealed an arsenal that would make even the _Destiny Ascension_ or a _Glacier-class _dreadnought take pause.

Across the hull, in the slashing, archaic script of the Brotherhood, was the station's name:

_Temple Prime._

And in the heart of the _Temple_, deep within his own personal sanctum, Kane stood before a vast, wall-to-wall display showing the planet below and reports from his station, He clasped his hands before him, showing none of the fatigue that one would have expected from such a swift transition from the Citadel on the other side of the galaxy, to his great _Temple _just in time to command it to reveal itself over his capital.

He exhaled, and smiled.

"It is good to be home." A gesture, and a hundred holographic displays flowed into the air around him, feeding him data from across the holdings of the Brotherhood - both official and secret.

"Now, my children," he said, with deadly eagerness, "it is time to begin our _true _work."

* * *

The Citadel Spectre Office was the anti-thesis of the Council Chamber. Where the Council reigned in a massive, high-ceilinged room with the light of the Serpent Nebula pouring down, with crowds of dignitaries and diplomats witnessing their decisions, the Spectre Office was a single small room jutting off from one of the myriad corridors of the Presidium's Embassy sector. The lights were dimmer than normal, and a few computer terminals, a couple of walls displaying news feeds and intelligence reports, and a single holotank were the only amenities. A second door opened into a shooting range to the right of the terminals.

It was a simple, spartan setup, which suited the Spectres just fine. They had no overarching command structure, nor any real logistics or support base dedicated to their operations. With their authority, they didn't need dedicated support. All that they required was a single office to handle the authorizations, procurement, and discreet communications that their scant numbers needed. It was rare for more than a couple of Spectres to ever even be in the room at once.

Today was one of those rare moments.

There were four Spectres gathered. It would have been a full six, but Serpentius Octavian was running down a rumor of Scrin activity in the Kepler Verge, and Jondum Bau was investigating activity in Nod territory in the Terminus Systems. That left Tela Vasir, Nihlus Kyrik, Garrus Vakarian, and Thane Krios.

Vasir sat on the railing around the computer terminals in the office, and she looked over the other three Spectres. Nihlus' fingers were working on the haptic interface of one of the computers, green eyes intent on whatever the display showed. He wore one of his typical suits of high-end, black-and-crimson armor. Garrus was seated at a bench nearby, working on a disassembled rifle, his omnitool glowing with minute mass effect fields playing over the components.

Krios sat in a chair close to the entry hallway, his eyes distant, his long, narrow-fingered hands folded up before him. The green-skinned drell wore a black jacket and tight-fitting pants of armor-weave fabric. Vasir knew from experience that the clothes were tailored to conceal a shield generator and a number of blades, small holdout pistols, and explosives. He stared at the news displays, and Vasir wondered if he was paying attention to them, meditating while using the colors and sounds as background noise, or losing himself in the drell's unusually-precise and hyper-detailed memories.

It was very rare for this many Spectres to work together. The general rule was "one Spectre, one exploding star system." The galaxy was simply too big and the Council's interests too expansive for Spectres to work in teams; they were expected to handle problems on their own. Bringing multiple Spectres together only happened for truly critical missions. The Krogan Rebellions had been the last time a large Spectre force had been assembled with the same task, and at no point during that war had the krogan directly threatened the Citadel itself.

The Scrin, under the command of Saren Arterius, had attacked the Citadel itself three weeks ago. They'd killed CDF crewmen, C-Sec officers, and GDI personnel that were under Citadel protection. The only reason the Council had not launched a full-scale military response was that they had nothing to mobilize against. Salarian STG teams and other Citadel intelligence wings were hunting for anything that they could use. But until that happened, the military was in a holding pattern.

"So, has anyone figured out what to blow up yet?" Vasir asked. She glanced to Nihlus. "I'm hoping someone has. Nice as it is to meet up again, this isn't exactly a social call."

"Intelligence is still forthcoming, unfortunately," Nihlus replied. The holo-tank beside Vasir lit up. "Until that time, we only have a limited number of concrete leads."

"The quarian data," Krios spoke. His voice was a low, melodic rumble, vaguely reptilian. And kind of sexy, Vasir admitted. "Though it has no direct connection to the Scrin."

"Scrin warriors," Garrus said, looking up from his rifle, "were trying to kill the quarians to keep them from giving us that intel. That's all the connection we need."

"Assuming these Scrin were under Saren's control, anyway," Vasir remarked. "Nice to know all our enemies are working together, right? No schisms, despite the GDI theories on Scrin sects?"

"We have little reason to believe these Scrin are of a schismatic faction," Thane said. "The evidence of cooperation is circumstantial, but significant. These quarians were targeted by mercenaries working for Saren, and then by Scrin that resembled those that attacked Eden Prime, also under Saren's control."

"You're assuming Saren is the one in control," Vasir pointed out. "What about other possibilities? GDI reports said that the Scrin were capable of mind control."

"A fair point to consider," Thane replied. "But I have reviewed the same reports, both from Earth and the Eden Prime attack. Saren's behavior is inconsistent with reported Scrin mind-control victims."

Vasir was about to speak again when Nihlus finished whatever he was doing. The hologram behind her resolved into an image of the galaxy, a swirling maelstrom of stars with colored sections dividing it up into political sectors: Citadel sectors - shaded by dominant species - taking up a third of the galaxy's claimed space, Terminus systems and their myriad species stretching across much of the remainder, and the intermixed tangle of GDI and Hegemony territory. There were marked enclaves of Brotherhood territory scattered around the galaxy, predominantly clustered in the Terminus and fringes of GDI-claimed space. The individually-claimed systems and small clusters held by individual Council species weren't marked, but that was to keep the resulting riot of colors from hurting their eyes. A small but wide section of space beyond the Terminus was marked as geth territory, and the current location of the bulk of the Migrant Fleet - just outside GDI territory - was also noted.

"Weird, when you look at it this way," Vasir murmured, letting her thoughts ramble out into words. She always spoke her mind, when she didn't _need_ to keep her thoughts hidden. "How all the little pricks are causing so much trouble these days." She gestured to the Terminus Systems. "But the biggest monster isn't even on our minds right now."

"The Terminus must always remain on our minds," Thane said. "A galaxy once split in two is now divided into three blocs, thanks to the humans. It makes for more interesting times."

"The quarian data has been translated, at least as best as it can so far," Nihlus cut in. Everyone turned toward him, recognizing his "briefing" voice. "The geth programming language is very unusual, not to mention the data is defended by extensive encryption. But with quarian assistance, GDI and the Citadel have managed to understand areas of high geth priority."

Several system markers appeared. Vasir frowned in curiosity as she read the names for them. Theseus. Pax. Elysta. Utopia. Asgard. Thorne.

"That's one hell of an inconsistent set of targets," Vasir said.

"Some of those are in GDI space," Garrus mused. "Utopia contains Eden Prime. Asgard contains Terra Nova."

"Correct," Nihlus said. "Some of the others are far stranger. There is nothing of value that I have been able to find in Elysta or Thorne. Theseus contains several worlds with extensive Prothean ruins, such as Feros."

"Noveria is in the Pax system," Vasir said, and they all nodded at the ugly implications of that. Geth interest in one of the galaxy's most secretive corporate research hub was never a good sign.

"The question is, what do the geth want with these worlds?" Nihlus said. "None of them have any military value. Two are primary human colony worlds, and Eden Prime had a Prothean relic of tremendous value."

"Perhaps Saren seeks something of equal value in the Asgard system, or on Feros," Krios suggested. "Theseus is close, relatively speaking, to GDI territory."

"Elysta is the strangest," Garrus said. "Its on the far side of the galaxy from all of the other geth points of interest. What would they want there?"

"We will obviously need to investigate each of these systems to determine what Saren is after," Nihlus said.

"We can alert GDI of the geth focus on Asgard," Krios said, and the others nodded. "If no one objects, I would choose to investigate Feros."

"Fair enough," Nihlus said. Vasir frowned, thinking about the systems in question, and after a moment, she hopped off the railing.

"Noveria," she said. "I've got contacts that can dig up a lot of dirt on what the corporations are up to there."

She didn't mention what she'd done to earn those contacts. The Shadow Broker asked a lot, but he paid even better, especially when it came to protecting galactic status quo. But even as immune to the law as a Spectre was, public knowledge that she played assassin and saboteur for the Broker wouldn't do Vasir any good.

"I suppose that leaves Thorne and Elysta," Garrus said. "I think-"

"I apologize, Vakarian," Nihlus cut in abruptly. "You have already been given an assignment. Direct from the Council."

He handed the Spectre a datapad. Garrus took it, mandibles flush with his jaw, and glanced over it. Vasir watched the turian's limited facial cues with interest. He seemed annoyed, at first, but then his expression and stance softened, before hardening in grim determination.

"I see," he said, and nodded. "Elysta or Thorne?"

"It depends on where they choose to go," Nihlus replied.

"Only one ship?" Garrus asked.

"Yes, but with a Spectre on board," Nihlus replied.

"Who will command it?" Garrus asked.

"GDI has yet to choose," Nihlus said, "but I suspect they will make the call soon."

Oh, now _that _was interesting. Vasir knew that the Council was going to allow GDI limited access to assist in the hunt for Saren, if only to avoid further diplomatic rifts. But military access of any kind was a major concession. She'd been expecting GDI Commandos or InOps representatives, not a warship.

"What about the Veil?" she asked as she mulled that over.

"The Council isn't committing any ships," Nihlus said. "We'll have difficulty crossing the Terminus Systems without provoking a war. So will GDI and the Migrant Fleet, but I suspect that neither they nor the Council care if they anger individual Terminus species."

Of course not. The Terminus feared the Council and GDI, but for different reasons. Terminus species worried that the Citadel would try to annex them, and hated the Council due to long-term animosity. But GDI inspired a different fear: the Verge War had shown everyone what happened when one provoked the humans, and no one wanted to provoke a war of retaliation instead of conquest. The Terminus might be a little less likely to attack any GDI ships, especially when backed by the Migrant Fleet, but that didn't guarantee there would be no war.

"And if GDI goes to war with the Terminus, the Council won't shed any tears," Vasir said.

"No, I suspect they won't." Nihlus shrugged. "No one is sure how the Terminus Systems will react. We'll have to keep a close eye on the situation, however. Our interests coincide, at the moment." He activated his omnitool, and everyone's devices pinged. "I am uploading all the quarian data that has been translated. You may review it at your discretion."

It wasn't a "dismissed;" the Spectres didn't have official ranks. But they had a _hierarchy_, albeit unspoken, and Nihlus was one of the top Spectres. Krios and Vakarian were younger, and they nodded at the unspoken end to their briefing. They turned and started to leave, Garrus scooping up and reassembling his rifle.

Vasir rose with the others, and as they started toward the exit, she steppe dup beside Nihlus and lightly smacked his shoulder. His head turned toward her in a sharp, avian jab.

"Kyrik," she said. "Keep yourself alive, okay? Getting slow in your old age."

Nihlus' mandibles parted slightly, in a gesture she'd come to learn was the turian equivalent of a thin smile. A rare expression from someone with a dreadnought up his ass like Nihlus.

"My bones are not as old as yours, Vasir," he said. "Take care as well. Our allies in this endeavor are as dangerous as our enemies."

Vasir thought to the mysterious lord of information that she owed her own success as a Spectre too, and nodded. Between the Broker, Nod, and GDI, and with the fact of Saren's betrayal hanging over them, he was very right. Their nominal allies could be just as deadly to them, and had secrets of their own.

Temple Prime's appearance had shown that much.

Which was just a slightly more precarious position than normal for Spectres.

"I'm not the one who got caught with my pants down, Kyrik," Vasir said with a wry grin. "Don't die on me."

"A promise I cannot keep," he admitted.

* * *

On the other side of the galaxy, Admiral Steven Hackett sat within the _GDS Philadelphia II, _among a nest of vipers, bears, and wolves, all clad in the uniforms of GDI military officers or the suits of civilian Directors. It wasn't an entirely unfair comparison for many of them, and was not usually detrimental with the kinds of jobs they had to do. Politicians and military were predators by nature, and directing those predatory tendencies toward external threats was productive, whether they were cold rivals like the Citadel, or bloody foes like the Scrin.

But Hackett knew that such predators could turn against their own if they smelled blood. It was far too common with both the civilian politicians and the internal politics of the military, and exacerbated by the institutional paranoia of spending centuries in an adversarial - at best - relationship with the Brotherhood of Nod. And today, he knew, some of those predators had the scent.

Especially because two weeks ago, Kane had pulled a space station the size of a dreadnought out of his ass. And more than the mass was the name of the station, and the ugly symbolism.

After all, every Tiberium War had, at one point or another, boiled down to a massive battle for _Temple Prime._

Hackett watched as a white, rectangular portal opened on the far side of the dark room, and for an instant a dark silhouette loomed in the doorway. Overhead lights trained on her as she entered, revealing a woman in the gray dress uniform of a GDI Marine officer. Other features became apparent as she crossed the room: extensive, ragged scars across her face, hair bound back into a tail, cold eyes, and from her left shoulder down, a gleaming gray, skeletal arm of ceramic and metal, angular plates covering the machinery of the military-grade augment. Aside from the insignia of a Lieutenant Commander, her uniform bore only one other decoration: a Commando patch on the upper sleeves.

She crossed the room and sat down at the table in the center. Another, semicircular table arced around the room, and overhead lights illuminated the men and women assembled: civilian Directors in suits and top-level military officers in their dress uniforms. None of the officers wore less than a Rear Admiral's insignia on their sleeves.

"Please seal the room," Director Saracino called, sitting to Hackett's left. The door closed, leaving the room dark save for the lights shining on the Commander and the assembled Director's Board members. The distant, faint thrum of counter-surveillance systems kicked in.

"Lieutenant-Commander Shepard," Hackett spoke, his voice a deep, gravelly rasp. "Good to see you back on your feet."

"Thank you, sir," Shepard replied. Hackett watched her carefully as she clasped her hands before her. The augmetic arm moved a with quick, sharp movements. Still becoming accustomed to it, he supposed. Three weeks wasn't enough time to go from clinically dead to providing testimony before a Board subcommittee, in Hackett's eyes.

"I apologize for interrupting your recovery this early, Commander," Saracino added. "But the events of the last few weeks have been rather troubling, and we require your testimony."

"I understand, sir," she replied. Cold, quiet, showing nothing but icy professionalism. "I can provide any clarification you need on the attack up until my injury. My memory became clouded afterward."

"Thank you, Commander, but we already have the reports from the rest of your team plus the survivors on the ground," Saracino said. "Our concern at the moment is not the Scrin attack. Our concern is Kane."

There was a very subtle tightening around Shepard's eyes at that. A twinge of wariness or suspicion? Not the reaction Hackett had expected.

"You are referencing my confrontation with him in the Citadel Tower," she said.

"Captain Anderson gave us a truncated version of what he remembers from your report to him prior to being shot," Saracino said. "But I have no reports from you regarding this conversation, Commander. Is there a reason for this oversight?"

"I was occupied in the hours between speaking with Kane and getting killed, sir," she replied. The cold professionalism in her voice became a bit drier. "Between the factory raid, the extraction of high-value intelligence assets, and the Scrin attack I was unable to provide a report. _Sir_."

Hackett could barely hear the _"you dolt"_ hidden in the last word's pronunciation.

If Saracino heard it, he showed no reaction.

"If you would, Commander, please tell this committee what you discussed with Kane when you confronted him," he said.

"What part, sir?" she replied.

"All of it, Commander," Saracino said.

"Do you want me to repeat the same details that Captain Anderson covered in his report, sir?"

"I'm looking to fill in any gaps with regards to the Captain's report, Commander," Saracino said, irritation creeping into his voice. "Please, just tell us everything you discussed."

Hackett frowned, wondering whether the Commander was deliberately being obtuse or not.

"I understand, sir," Shepard replied. "I'm just trying to make sure I'm telling you what you want to hear."

Hackett's frown deepened, and Saracino scowled.

"Please, Commander," the Director said after a moment, carefully controlling his annoyance.

Hackett listened closely as Shepard explained in short, curt sentences how she had first pursued Kane, spoken with him, learned of his admission regarding the Tacitus, his warning relating to the Reapers, and his information on the pair of quarians.

"Commander," spoke up one of the other admirals, "Why is Kane still breathing?"

Hackett glanced at the admiral in question: Rear Admiral Azuki, a lean, graying figure whose dress grays slung tight to his frame. Azuki was head of Navy Intelligence Operations. He sat to the left of Admiral Volker, the civilian head of all InOps branches. Both were men who favored paranoia, even over the GDI norm, and their reaction when Kane had first revealed himself had been to advocate immediate aggression against Nod holdings in the Terminus. The _Temple Prime_ revelation had only made their demands even louder and had gathered some more vocal followers.

They wanted someone to blame. Someone on GDI's side, that they could immediately target and retaliate against for everything that had happened. A head for the chopping block.

"I considered killing him, sir," Shepard replied to Azuki's question. "I decided that the possibility of provoking a full-scale war with the Citadel by murdering a diplomatic envoy in the heart of the Citadel was not worth the potential gains. _Sir_."

"A reasoned decision, Commander," Hackett cut in. He glanced across the table at Azuki, and the other officer stayed quiet. "Though this admission regarding the Tacitus is troubling. It implies security breaches far more extensive than we would have thought possible."

"Relaxing the security policies surrounding Nod was obviously a mistake," Azuki murmured, and several other officers and Directors grunted assent. "We would have detected things like _Temple Prime_ much earlier.

"Unverifiable. Those policies were put in place decades ago," Saracino said. "Though we have to admit that Kane would not be able to achieve what he did without some support on the Citadel."

"Citadel support or not, _Kane _was responsible for the Tacitus," Hackett cut in. He kep his voice carefully modulated to hide his own irritation. The last thing they needed now was for Saracino and his anti-Citadel bloc to insert their agenda into this hearing. "That should be our focus, gentlemen. We need to be certain that our own command structure isn't playing to his tune."

"Of course, Admiral," Saracino said, "but penetration by the Brotherhood might also mean we face intrusion by salarian-"

"Then we step up security to deal with them, just as we need to deal with Kane," Hackett cut him off. "I'll authorize more stringent internal defense and counterintelligence."

Everyone around the table shuffled in annoyance or resignation at that. Institutional paranoia was bad enough at slowing down day-to-day operations even without an active hunt for moles and security breaches. But there was nothing they could do about it but weather the tightened defenses.

"What about the Scrin?" Azuki added. "Was Kane responsible for them as well?"

"I do not know, sirs," Shepard replied, drawing everyone's eye back toward her. "However, Kane's warning, and what I saw from the Tacitus itself, would lead me to conclude that they aren't allies."

"_Thank you_ for your input, Commander," Saracino replied, but his tone was unquestionably dismissive. "Gentlemen, I would advise we leave speculation out of this hearing. Agreed?"

Murmurs of assent. Hackett frowned, and spoke up before anyone could beat him to it.

"Commander, do you have any further corroboration regarding this 'Reaper' threat?" he asked. Best to keep the Admirals and Directors focused on real - or at least perceived external - threats like Nod, Saren, or these Reapers. Otherwise a viper like Azuki might opt to voice his suspicions more clearly.

"Only the information that Kane gave me, sir," she replied.

"Well, we certainly will rely on that," Azuki murmured, not hiding his dismissal of that resource.

"With respect, _sir_, the rest of Kane's intelligence checked out," Shepard replied, turning toward the Admiral. "Saren's mercenaries abducted a quarian to get their intelligence, the Shadow Broker was attempting to recover the quarian intelligence, and the Scrin attacked the Citadel in an open assault to acquire the data. Its obvious that they were all worried about something they held."

"Yes, Commander, we know that," Saracino replied. "We've had analysts going over the quarian data over the last three weeks. But the concern is not with the quarian data, but these 'Reapers' that Kane is warning of. I'll be honest, Commander, I am extremely skeptical of anything that comes out of Kane's mouth, especially secondhand."

"I understand, sir."

"What this data we fought so hard for does tell us is the location of many geth outposts and areas of interest, which is proving most useful for our planning of our incursions into geth space," he continued. "It does nothing to help us corroborate these claims regarding these Reapers."

"The visi-" Shepard paused. "The _information _I received from the Tacitus-"

"Yes, Commander, I know," Saracino replied. "We've tried to go over the reports you made regarding the information. Frankly, that information is extremely suspect."

"Both the information," Azuki said, "and its source."

Shepard's eyes narrowed and went very hard. Her shoulders rose once and fell, and Hackett recognized the breathing exercises most biotics practiced to keep their mass effect fields from flaring up at times of intense emotion.

"All of this data is highly suspect, gentlemen," Azuki continued. "I doubt the validity of it, and believe we should focus on trustworthy resources that haven't been compromised by alien influence or-

"Gentlemen," Hackett interrupted, his voice calm and quiet, "If any of you intend to accuse a Commando of treason by collusion with an agent of the Brotherhood of Nod in order to undermine GDI military operations, and an accessory to theft of Prothean technology, I would appreciate it if it was made openly. The same would go for accusations regarding mental health of GDI personnel after exposure to alien technology. A clear expression of concern would be useful for this committee to make decisions."

Several mutters and nods went up around the room, and Saracino, Azuki, and their respective allies went very quiet. Out the corner of his eye, Hackett saw no reaction from Shepard except to reach up with her left hand - the prosthetic one - to brush some loose hair back over her ear. It appeared too controlled and careful to be anything but deliberate.

Azuki glanced quickly to Volker, and then to Saracino. There was a tightening of the eyes from the Director, and Hackett saw him weighing responses to the blunt accusation. It would leave the Director with only two choices: drop the insinuations for the hearing, or admit to his accusations. One was preferable, but the other would open them up to a whole range of counterpoints that would render the position untenable.

Blunt, tactless statements had their uses.

"I apologize if that was the impression_ I _was giving," Saracino said after a moment. He turned to Shepard. "I meant no disrespect or accusation, Commander, especially in light of your sacrifices in service to the Initiative."

Good. A blunt confrontation like that wasn't likely to win him any points, but Hackett cared little for politics - and he had the service record to let him withstand far worse. Besides, putting Volker, Azuki, and their witch-hunting lackeys on the spot would remind them not to try this crap again in the future.

"I . . . apologize as well, Commander," Azuki said, sitting back in his chair. He glared daggers at Hackett, who did not dignify them with a response.

"If that's all on that front, gentlemen," Hackett said, "We'll leave further speculation and discussion on the threat of the Reapers to a closed session." He turned back toward Shepard, tapping his datapad.

"Now, Commander," Hackett said tapping his datapad. "We need to corroborate some reports on the Scrin, and as our foremost field expert on the species, I would run some combat reports on what we saw at the Embassy. First . . . ."

As he spoke, and started asking Shepard more tame questions, he saw her relax, but only slightly. She wasn't entirely out of trouble, as her discussion with Kane had drawn far too many paranoid eyes, but he'd kept the witch-hunters on the Board off her back.

Hopefully, that would be enough.

* * *

Two weeks had been enough time for Horizon to return to normal, although the population had exploded by another half a million pilgrims and devotees with the appearance of _Temple Prime_ in orbit.

The reaction had been as expected. GDI was scrambling in response, issuing warnings and demands for inspections and threats of sanctions and even military action. The Council was in session and expressing their concerns. Terminus pirate activity in every sector connected to the Iera relay had utterly vanished. And more than a dozen splinter sects of the Brotherhood had either reaffirmed their loyalty to Kane or had suffered abrupt, bloody changes in leaderships and _then_ reaffirmed their loyalty.

But for the bald, black-shrouded being standing in his private sanctum on the Temple, looking over the world below and surrounded by the constant glow of a hundred holographic displays, the Temple's abrupt appearance had a simple meaning: a display of power to give enemies - and potential enemies - a moment's pause. For if he could conjure up a station of the scale of a GDI supercarrier from seemingly nowhere, what else did Kane have hidden in the sleeves of his robes?

The reality of the situation, of course, was far different, and as he read the reports flowing in from across his secret empire, Kane shook his head and loosed a rueful laugh.

"Something amusing?" asked Miranda Lawson. He glanced up at the cyborg agent standing a few meters away, and then turned to peer across the inner sanctum. Much like everything else on the station, it was built of dark metals, with red display terminals rising up out of knee-high mist, and an omnipresent red lighting just bright enough that one could see without hurting their eyes. There were chairs and benches scattered around the wide room, and doors split off to his private chambers, but this room was where he did much of his work. The data displays and holograms moved around the chamber with him, rising out of the mist like ghosts. At the far end of the chamber was a massive hologram of Horizon itself, a high-resolution display so detailed it was indistinguishable from an actual window.

"A consideration," he said as he paced, his data-ghosts following him. The mists parted around his cloak as he walked with confidence. Unlike most people, he carried a direct-to-retina display system and short-range sensors in his omnitool that warned him when he was about to stumble over something in the mists, so he could step around obstacles without tripping or banging his shins.

"And, perhaps, a miscalculation," he added, pausing. He waved a small flock of displays as their reports finished, and brought up another group. "Temple Prime has had its desired effect, but the reports of the most recent disappearances has made reconsider the wisdom of this sort of power display."

"You believe that the Collectors are a reaction to the Temple?" she asked.

He nodded, pensive, and dismissed the images after a few moments.

"It is possible that in attempting to dissuade others from acting against us, we drew attention from those with far more power instead," he mused. He looked up to Miranda, and shook his head. "Or perhaps they were simply planning this already and the Temple caused them to push their schedule forward. Or more worrying, the Temple did not even factor into their plans at all."

"How so?" his right hand asked, following him slowly across the room. He noted that she, too, moved with confidence in the obscuring mists; perhaps Miranda had installed the same short-range sensor program in her own systems?

"Imagine our chances of success if our enemy considers the _Temple _itself insignificant," he said. Miranda remained silent, and he made most of a circuit around the room, reading the entire way, before he turned back toward his agent.

He had lived more than long enough to know when a human was troubled, and a quick study of her features told Kane that Miranda was worried about something other than this external threat. He had forced himself to rekindle his capacity to read human behavioral patterns after that unfortunate _incident_ with Kovacs that had violently derailed many of his plans in the Third Tiberium War. If it would help him defuse his subordinates' issues . . . .

It took only moments to conclude what she was concerned about.

"Scrin are terrifying up close," he said, carefully couching his words to make them into an offhand comment. "Even moreso when one sees their abilities face-to-face."

Miranda looked up at Kane, and then glanced away. It took her a moment to speak again.

"They would have killed me," she said. "Not to mention that huge bastard with the grenade launcher. How exactly are we supposed to fight them when they have that kind of firepower?"

"As I recall, you fought them well enough," Kane said. He hid his distant irritation; the last thing he needed right now was to play therapist. "Considering their weaponry and our limitations."

"I've got some of the most advanced wetware and nanotech modifications in the galaxy," she muttered, "And in the face of _them_ I was completely outmatched. Without Marked rescue I would have been killed."

"Indeed," Kane said, bringing up another set of reports. He perused them while continuing to speak. "You were outmatched, strength for strength. That is a summation of the Brotherhood's entire history, however."

She looked up at him, and he continued, deciding what to say to end this useless self-recrimination quickly.

"Your enhancements make you one of the most dangerous covert operatives in the galaxy, Miranda," he said. "Just because you could not easily defeat a tactless brute working for deluded fools, nor the assault troops of an alien power whose technology is beyond ours does not diminish that." He closed the screens and looked back toward her.

"Take from that defeat a simple truth," he said, striding toward her. "The nanotech your father gave you should not be your only weapon. Relying entirely on what was forced upon you will get you killed."

He paused before her and laid a hand on her shoulder. She closed her eyes, and slowly nodded.

"Of course," she said.

"Go forth, renewed in strength," he said, and turned away. He waved up another set of reports. "Now, I have another task for you."

She opened her eyes, and he moved the hologram around to face her. Her brows knitted in confusion.

"Terra Nova?" she asked, and he nodded. A moment later her omnitool lit up as data was uploaded.

"That should contain the full briefing," he said. "I've already sent orders to the stealth frigate _Dorian_. Time is short."

"Of course," she said, her words faster and more urgent as she realized what she was reading, and what it could mean. She snapped a sharp salute. "One vision."

"One purpose," he replied with a nod, and Miranda turned to leave, already speaking into her earpiece as she departed the sanctum, leaving Kane to his reports and commands.

* * *

The office of Councilor Sparatus was far less opulent than Garrus expected it to be; the turian was a person who took his work seriously. Garrus passed through the doorway into the wide, open, and mostly empty room, only decorated by a couple of framed battle honors and holos of the Councilor's military career. The Councilor himself sat behind his desk, and stood as Garrus entered.

"You summoned me, sir?" Garrus asked, standing at attention in front of the desk.

"Spectre Vakarian," Sparatus said, clasping his hands behind his back. "What is your opinion of the human species?"

Garrus blinked a couple of times at the blunt question, and moreso, at whatever motives Sparatus had for asking it. He definitely was not asking it to evaluate Garrus; the orders regarding the GDI liaison were already cleared directly from Sparatus himself.

"I have had limited contact," he started to say, and Sparatus nodded and spoke before Garrus could continue.

"Part of why I am asking you," he said. "You aren't tainted by long-term contact but your familiarity does counteract the limitations of media stereotypes and extensive cultural bias."

"I see," Garrus said, and he shrugged. "Based on personal experience, they are efficient and brutal. Ruthless. Tactless. But not savage. Kind of like the krogan, without the ingrained nihilism, rampant birthrate, and uncontrolled aggression." He paused, mandibles switching a couple of times in thought. "In fact, I'd wager they would be exactly what the krogan would have become, under different circumstances."

"An apt observation, Spectre," Sparatus said with a nod. "Are those flaws or strengths, in your estimation?"

Garrus thought over that for a few seconds, and then finally shrugged.

"Yes," he replied, and Sparatus nodded again. The councilor's hands moved over his desk's haptic display, and Garrus' omnitool lit up at the handshake protocol.

"STG has sent me an interesting report," Sparatus said. "Collating the data from the geth with what we know about the Protheans. I believe I know what they are after on Elysta, though why is unclear."

Garrus' eyes roved over the data, and his mandibles spread, then tightened against his jaw.

"Yes," he said after a few more moments. "That would explain a lot." He looked back up at the Councilor. "Why me, sir? If I can ask."

"Because this is a bleeding wound that needs to be staunched, and _fast_," Sparatus said. "Not just for the Citadel, but for the Hierarchy as well. Saren must _die_ for what he has done. No matter what it takes. Understood?"

"Perfectly," Garrus said, an eager edge to his voice, and he saluted. That explained quite a bit, actually. If you wanted something done fast and hard, well, there were worse tactics than putting a Spectre known for aggressiveness on a ship belonging to a species known for the same, and then giving them blanket approval to kick ass. If Sparatus wanted this problem annihilated, Garrus could do just that.

"Good luck, Spectre," Sparatus added, and returned Garrus' salute. "Dismissed."

* * *

"_Think you can talk and dance at the same time?"_

Those words had begun this especially rough session on the _Honolulu _Orbital Rehab and Training Facility's simulated assault course, and Shepard took to the challenge with eagerness.

Shepard charged up the ramp, Werewolf blasting and recoil hammering her shoulder, her augmented arm keeping the barrel steady despite blasting away at fully automatic. Targets ahead flared and vanished atop the simulated ridge overlooking the simulated rocky crater that formed this part of the assault course. She reached the top of the ramp and slid into cover behind a head-height wall just as a pair of heavy machineguns ten meters to the left of the targets began spraying faux mass accelerator fire upon her position.

On a walkway a few meters to her left, a hulking figure in heavy armor raised a grenade launcher and dumped three sonic grenades into the gun nest. They flared and vanished.

"You're clear, Sparks, move up!" shouted the vaguely Hispanic-accented voice of Lieutenant James Vega.

Shepard rounded the wall and rushed across the walkway, charging through a doorway. Her HUD flashed an objective: close assault of targets in the next room. She switched to her grenade launcher module, loaded a stun round, and fired it through the next door. She was a heartbeat behind the deafening burst, firing point-blank shots into the targets that appeared in the chamber beyond. One of the holographic, humanoid wireframes leapt at her from her left side, too close to pivot, and she instead slashed out with her left hand.

The augment cut through the wireframe figure, which flew backward as if it had taken a grenade to the chest.

"Keep that up, Commander!" Vega shouted as he ran past her. "We've got good time!"

"This isn't about setting a record," Shepard growled, but she chased after the massive soldier all the same, determined to keep up with him.

"Just sayin', Sparks, you got damn good moves for a dead woman!" he replied as they entered a larger room. The holographic emitters shaped it into a warehouse of sorts, and wireframe humanoid enemies started appearing, rifles firing simulated shots. The two GDI officers began advancing, cutting them down.

"I didn't ask for this," Shepard admitted as she cut down fake enemy after fake enemy. "But these augs _kick ass_."

Vega laughed, and pressed the attack.

The whole point behind the course wasn't to set a time record. The point was to see how well the augments were taking. Lieutenant Vega was the _Honolulu _station's master at arms, responsible for all the weapons maintenance and training operations in the simulators, and he had been pushing Shepard's testing program as far as he could. This was the fifth run in two days that he'd accompanied her while stress-testing her augments, and thus far they had proven more than up to the task of getting her functional again.

Her left arm was gone. Total prosthetic replacement. She'd demanded, and gotten, top-of-the-line, cutting edge military hardware installed. Nanoweave fibers connected the nerves of her chest muscles to the arm, letting her move it as readily as her original arm. An element zero weave roughly simulated the eezo nodules that had been in her original arm. She didn't have the same fine control as before, but had learned that one of the modules included in the arm enabled her to concentrate her biotics to generate a strong, concave mass effect barrier, similar to an omnitool shield.

Beyond that, internal injuries had been severe enough to require a total replacement of both lungs. Supporting the increased strength of her new arm also meant that many of her torso muscles had to be augmented with a high-density muscle weave, and her spine had to be replaced completely.

The surgery had taken more than a week to complete, during which time she'd been unconscious and facing more of those strange Tacitus visions. Recovery had taken another two weeks. A century ago, she would have been down for six to twelve months. Now, she had only been out of action for three weeks, and then had taken another week to make sure the augments were taking properly.

Judging by how they were blasting through this assault course, they were doing a damned good job of it.

It was unusual, considering GDI's reluctance in some areas with cybernetics. They were quick to augment and assist soldiers, but only to a limited degree, and there was no industrialized augmentation program. They all remembered what CABAL had done during the Firestorm Crisis, as well as what Kane's Marked had been capable of, and no one wanted a repeat of that horror show. Such extensive augmentation as the kind she'd been gifted with was uncommon, even for a GDI Commando.

"Hear you're going to be put on the front again soon, Sparks," Vega called as they moved down a corridor to another room, weapons at the ready.

"I hope, Lieutenant," she replied. She let the nicknaming thing slide; apparently it was how Vega remembered people, and he wasn't exactly in her chain of command.

"Though damn, I don't know which front. There's two now," Vega muttered. He pulled a grenade from his belt. "Stunner, going in!"

The grenade detonated in the next room, and they surged through. Ten seconds of unrecountable savagery against holograms, and they moved on.

"My cousin, in the reserves, gettin' mobilized," Vega added as they advanced down the next passage. "This is, like, the perfect thing for the batarians. GDI gettin' split across two fronts. Three maybe, with the Scrin too."

"Sounds like you want to get in on the action," Shepard mused as they reached the next door. She blew the door down with a simulated breaching charge, and they stormed the next room.

"Hell yeah, ma'am," he said. "Don't plan to get stuck here orbiting Earth. They're gonna need handsome mutants like me on the front, kicking synthetic ass."

Shepard had to put her response on hold, as she received a notification in her HUD that someone was waiting for them outside the training room.

"Speed this up, Lieutenant," she said, and he nodded.

"Try to keep up, ma'am," he said, and they pushed through the course, killing holographic foes and pushing past obstacles generated by mass effect fields.

When she exited the simulator a few minutes later, sweaty and panting, they had defeated the previous record for that mission variant by twenty seconds. They saluted the officer waiting for them outside, in a control room suffused with the harsh blue lightning of a multitude of displays. Observation crew sat at the terminals, reviewing the data from the simulator.

"Impressive work, Shepard," Captain Anderson offered as they exited, and Shepard shook his hand.

"Thank you, sir," she replied. She glanced over her captain, and saw no signs of his previous injury. Of course, he would have spent less time in recovery than her. He'd merely gotten shot, while Shepard had been clinically dead for several minutes and then been rebuilt.

"Lieutenant," she added, turning to the mutant officer. "Dismissed. Thanks for the workout."

"Anytime, Sparks," he replied, and left Shepard and Anderson to talk alone. After the lieutenant had departed, Anderson gestured for Shepard to walk with him. They stepped out of the control room and started heading down the blank gray-white corridors of the _Honolulu_ platform.

"Your augs have been returning some impressive data," Anderson said. "You look to be adapting faster than anticipated."

"It feels weird, sir," Shepard admitted. "The handling is off sometimes. I love the response time and strength, but its taking time to get used to the reaction speed. Before they adjusted the strength-governing software I was crushing my weapon everytime I entered the simulator."

"Yet you and Vega just smashed the record on that assault course," Anderson noted. "You confident that you can enter combat like this?"

"If necessary," she replied, glancing at the conspicuous plating covering the prosthetic. "Has something happened, sir?"

Anderson looked away for a moment, and sighed.

"A hell of a lot happened while you were down these last four weeks," he said.

"I saw the reports on the _Temple Prime_ station," Shepard said. "And the mobilization against the geth. If the Board needs me, I can fight, sir."

She left out that she was hoping to not be sent against Nod. In fact, she was hoping they wouldn't take action against Kane, but the _Temple _station's appearance made that hope thin. They needed to be focused on the real threat instead of chasing ghosts of the past.

Anderson came to a halt, and glanced behind them, before turning back to her. His words were quiet.

"The Council has authorized a single GDI ship to assist in hunting Saren," he said. "Small Marine compliment, and with a Spectre onboard to provide oversight. We'll be sending the _Normandy_. Fast and quiet and well-armed. The Board has asked for you to command it."

She blinked in surprise.

"Sir?" she blurted, master of tongue and manipulation that she was. "Why me? I'm just-"

"A damned good soldier," Anderson replied. "A good officer and commander, who has the respect of the Council after what happened on the Citadel. Plus you have experience fighting the geth, Saren, and the Scrin. You're the logical choice, Commander."

She shook her head, trying to process that. She'd been hoping for her own command one day, but this was completely out of the black. Not to say that she wasn't going to take it, because she wanted to track that turian bastard down and punch him so hard he exploded.

"Just say yes, and its yours, Shepard," Anderson said.

"I'll take it, sir," Shepard said after a few moments.

The Captain nodded, and sighed as though he were releasing a great burden.

"Thank you, Shepard," he said. "I'll get the details and paperwork to you soon. And-" He reached into one of his jacket pockets and took out a small case. He handed it to her. "Just sign the paperwork when it gets to your cabin."

She took the case and opened it. A Commander's insignia stared back at her, along with a data chip that she knew would have the authorization codes that came with the new rank.

"Congratulations, _Commander_," Anderson said, before turning and walking down the corridor.

* * *

The next day saw an avalanche of paperwork that took Shepard _far_ too long to shovel through. Medical release forms, command authorization forms, rank-promotion verification forms, payroll forms, and more. InOps piled on enough covert operation release and authorization forms and classified information clearances to fill a small library; Shepard privately suspected that one of InOps' counterintelligence strategies was to overwhelm enemy spies with the sheer amount of paperwork they'd have to chew through to find anything of value.

She soldiered through them as fast as possible, and finally received clearance to depart the _Honolulu_ platform, though not before putting in and pulling rank to fast-track a personnel transfer.

"Damn, Sparks, barely gave me time to pack," Lieutenant Vega grunted as he boarded the shuttle. Out of his hulking armor, Vega was a tremendous slab of muscle. He had dark eyes and tanned skin, with short-cut black hair and a face that looked like it would have been somewhat handsome if it hadn't been for the crystals jabbing through his skin. Shaved, glassy green crystals poked out of his forehead and left cheekbones, and others jutted from his forearms and poked at his shoulders and chest enough that they were visible through his uniform grays.

"Didn't think a grunt like you had much to keep," Shepard asked, and he shrugged, showing off rippling muscles. Shepard tried not to be distracted by them. Admittedly, there was a _lot_ of James Vega to not be distracted by. Hell, his pecs probably had pecs of their own.

"More like I got to copy and send all the weapon logs and simulator records to the next guy, so he doesn't freak out when he comes on duty," Vega said. "Plus, get stationed at a comfy place like this, you start settin' down roots, you know?"

"I thought you didn't like comfy postings?" Shepard asked. "You wanted to be on the sharp end."

"Hell yeah, but comfy has its perks," Vega said. "Saw enough of the sharp end while I slogged around in the Verge War. Batarians don't fight friendly."

"Nobody fights friendly," Shepard said, but then nodded. "I fought in the Verge too. Mostly ship-to-ship actions, boardings, station assaults. When the enemy goes low-tech, things get real ugly."

"Ground fighting wasn't much better," Vega grunted. "Rather fight Scrin than take on batarians in urban fighting."

"You'll get your chance, Lieutenant," Shepard promised. Vega nodded, expression grim but determined. "And you might change your mind when you meet them."

"Squishing bugs, ma'am?" he asked, and a smile forced its way through the seriousness. "What I was _born_ to do."

* * *

The _Normandy _was docked with the _Philadelphia II_, and after an hour's worth of security checks and even more paperwork, Shepard finally got a chance to take in her ship from an observation deck overlooking the docking rings. Captain Anderson stood with her, with Vega looming a few steps away, gawking at the frigate.

"It looks different," Shepard mused. While she had gotten a good view of the ship from the outside when she had been assigned to it a month ago, the fact that she was in command of it now made her give it a much closer and sharper inspection. She could see the turian influence in the design, in how much more narrow it was than typical GDI warships of the same tonnage. Most GDI ships were effectively massive flying bricks, unsubtle and no-nonsense. The _Normandy _was blocky as well, but leaner and sharper. No real curves, not like the Nod vessels she had seen, but instead the design was dominated by angular slopes and flat planes. Yet it was still lean and sleek compared with other GDI designs. A dagger among an arsenal of broadswords.

But closer inspection also showed modifications, of the kind only human rapid fabrication were capable of. The Orca deployment bays on the cargo section were expanded. She counted at least two additional GARDIAN batteries. A set of tube-shaped missile launchers had been bolted to the hull, and the main battery now consisted of a twinned ion cannon instead of the single-barreled version standard on frigates.

"Are those disruptor torpedoes?" Shepard asked, gesturing toward the tubes.

"In case you need to sneak up on someone to deliver a knockout blow," Anderson confirmed.

"Where are we getting the power for a twinned ion battery and those GARDIANs?" she asked.

"_Normandy's_ drive core is twice the size of standard frigate drives," Anderson reminded her. "You won't be able to move as fast as normal if you're using it to charge both cannons, but the core should let you recharge and shoot a hell of a lot faster, while still keeping the shields and point defense functional."

"That kind of firepower would give us a chance to take on cruisers," Shepard mused. "Can we even call this beautiful monster a frigate anymore?"

Anderson chuckled.

"She's yours now," he said. "I hope you never need to use those guns tp bring down Saren, but that's wishful thinking."

"What about you, sir?" she asked, turning toward the Captain.

"The Board has set up a special task force to deal with Saren," he said, the smile fading. "Admiral Hackett is commanding it, and we're going to be moving against the geth soon enough. Not a good idea to start a two-front war, but . . . ." He shrugged again. "They want me onboard. I've dealt with Saren before. They want the closest thing they can get to an expert on him."

She saw right through that.

"You're getting kicked up the ladder," Shepard said. Anderson sighed and nodded.

"I told them I would rather command a ship," he said. "I would have preferred to captain the _Normandy _and let you continue to act as a ground officer. But the Board said otherwise. Half of them see you as their rising star, because of how you worked with the Citadel. The other half want to see you burn because they think you're a Nod sympathizer. Kane's stunt on Horizon has made them even more leery. So they _all_ want you to have a command of your own."

"If I win, I'm a legend," she said, exhaling. "If I fail, I'm a scapegoat. Typical. Not unexpected, but . . . ." She shook her head. "More fair than what you've got, sir."

"I know," Anderson said. "But at least on this task force, I can do some good. Hackett's a good officer and he listens to his subordinates and advisors. Also." Anderson straightened up. "Admiral Parker is organizing a rapid-response force to deal with geth and Scrin incursions, but you'll also be able to call on them if needed. If you find a target that's too big or too valuable for the _Normandy's _arsenal, feel free to call them in."

"Alright, so I have an option if I need to set an entire star system on fire," Shepard said, for once happy at the idea of Havoc's brand of havoc. "Good to know." She paused for a moment. "Is there anything else, sir?"

It was a statement that held an odd sense of finality to it. Though the _Normandy _was already hers, Anderson had yet to really transfer command in a personal sense. She could see him hesitating, peering out at his frigate. Finally, he turned to her and held out his hand.

"She's a damn good ship, Shepard," he said. "Take good care of her."

"I will, sir," she replied, shaking his offered hand.

"Good luck, and good hunting," he said. "Bring that son of a bitch down."

"Hard as I can, sir," she promised.

* * *

As with her exterior inspection, Shepard found the interior of the _Normandy _falling under much closer scrutiny as she entered it. Maybe it was the fundamental realization that this was _her_ ship, and not simply the fact that she was part of the ship's crew, that was making her give the _Normandy _such an evaluative eye.

"Commander," Joker called as she walked down the crew corridor, and she looked up to see the pilot limping toward her.

"Joker," she replied. "Good to see you again."

"And its good to see you're back among the living, too," he replied. "Unless, well, you're a zombie. I recommend Pressly's skull as the softest, if you were gonna snack on anyone's brains."

"Might have some metal bits added on, but I'm not going to eat anyone," she replied.

"That's reassuring, Commander," he said. "Hey, maybe if you kill a bunch of geth and Scrin, we can strip them for parts? Turn you into a giant killer doom cyborg?"

"I doubt it," Shepard said, shaking her head, but made a mental note to ask Tali about the idea. That also reminded her . . . .

"EVA, status of the ship's crew?" she asked.

"_All crew accounted for,"_ the Normandy's EVA replied._ "In addition, Council Spectre liaison and Migrant Fleet advisor and bodyguard are present and accounted for."_

"If you wanted to know if we were here, you could have just asked, Captain," called a familiar voice. Shepard turned to see Tali walking up the crew corridor toward them - or she presumed it was Tali, as she wore the same quarian suit from before. Behind her loomed Kal'Reegar -or so Shepard guessed as well.

"Its Commander for now, Tali," Shepard said with a smile. "But good to see you. I figured you would be down in Engineering." She then nodded to Tali's bodyguard. "Kal'Reegar."

"Ma'am."

"I didn't know Tali warranted a bodyguard," Shepard said as she walked with them toward the CIC.

"I didn't ask for him, but my father assigned a guard anyway," Tali muttered.

"Price of being an Admiral's daughter, ma'am," Kal'Reegar replied. "Besides, it was convenient. We were together. I was already protecting Tali'Zorah anyway."

"Your father is an Admiral?" Shepard asked, and Tali nodded.

"Long story," she said. "I might explain it later once we're underway."

"Hopefully it won't take too long," called a turian voice from the other side of the CIC. "I'm ready to get this business concluded." Shepard grinned again as she saw Garrus Vakarian standing beside the CIC, and beside him was Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko.

Garrus reached out a hand, and she shook it, and then returned Kaidan's salute.

"They didn't tell me you were going to be our Spectre liaison," Shepard said, and Garrus shrugged.

"They said that they needed to 'mitigate collateral damage'," Garrus said. "The Council was afraid I would start dropping asteroids on colonies if they let me run loose after Saren, so they leashed me to your ship."

"Biggest mistake they ever made," Kaidan promised, and Garrus barked a laugh.

"In truth," the turian said, "Councilor Sparatus wants Saren dead, and he thinks you're the best chance to do that."

"Really?" Shepard asked, skeptical.

"Surprising, I know. But he was adamant that we take down Saren fast, and before things got worse. So here we are."

Shepard nodded, and walked up toward the CIC command station. She checked crew status anyway on her omnitool as she did so, and saw everyone was at their stations. With a nod, she reached down and activated the shipwide intercom. Shepard leaned against the railing, and exhaled.

"This is Commander Shepard to all crew. We are preparing to launch." She paused, and double-checked that all pre-flight operations were concluded. They were; the _Normandy _could detach and depart the system at any time.

"Speeches are not my thing," she lied as she finished making sure the _Normandy _was ready. "So I'll be straight and honest with you. We have our orders: find Saren Arterius and stop him from attacking our colonies. No matter what it takes."

What else to say to the crew? They needed to know the stakes, at the very least. To know what was at risk, and what they faced.

"He has an army. An armada. Technology we haven't even begun to properly understand. And a willingness to destroy entire worlds to his own ends. He has attacked one of humanity's core colonies. He and his minions attacked our allies. He has attacked the Citadel itself. There is no limit to what he is willing to do to."

Now that they had an idea, they needed to know what was most important of all:

"All of that is irrelevant. This is the _GDS Normandy_, the finest ship in the GDI Navy. Her crew are the finest hand-picked officers and marines in the galaxy, both human and non-human. If there is anyone at all in the galaxy able to stop Saren, they've been assembled on this ship."

They were going to kill the hell out of Saren and his minions.

"I've never been more honored to command a force than I am today. We have been given the most important mission in the galaxy, and we will succeed, no matter the cost."

She stood straight, and issued her first order as the _GDS Normandy's_ commanding officer.

"Everyone to your stations. Let's go get the bastard."

Shepard turned to Joker, who sat poised, hands over the glowing arsenal of controls.

"Helm, get us moving."

"Aye-aye, ma'am," Joker replied.

The _Normandy _disengaged with a tremendous shudder, and pivoted in place, drifting away from the _Philadelphia II_. The faster-than-light mass effect field flickered up around the frigate, and with a thrum that ran through the entire vessel, its engines ignited and sent it blasting into the void toward the Charon Relay, and the galaxy beyond.

* * *

_**Codex: Global Defense Initiative - Unified Human Armistice Treaty**_

_The Unified Human Armistice Treaty, or "UHAT," is an agreement between the Global Defense Initiative and all recognized sects of the Brotherhood of Nod. In order to allow the Brotherhood of Nod autonomy within GDI borders and prevent the outbreak of war with independent Nod colonies forming in the Attican Traverse and Terminus Systems, the UHAT was formed to limit Brotherhood military capability. The breaking of UHAT provisions is considered grounds for war between GDI and whichever Brotherhood faction violated the terms._

_Under the provisions of the UHAT, the Brotherhood is allowed to maintain a sizable but "defensive" fleet of frigates, cruisers, and light fighter-carriers. UHAT prohibits the deployment of Brotherhood military ships to the sovereign territory of any other interstellar nation without "just cause." The UHAT lists these exceptions as unprovoked aggression by the other party, direct attack by the same, or joint GDI/Nod operations. Brotherhood forces may also engage in limited military action pending executive approval by the GDI Director's Board._

_Strict mass limitations are imposed on cruisers and light carriers, though not on frigates or fighters. Dreadnoughts, heavy carriers, and supercarriers are banned. There are no limitations on space station mass or firepower, due to the prevalence of massive orbital habitat platforms, but there are limitations on the engine capabilities of these stations in order to prevent loopholes from being used to turn craft classified as space stations into warships._

_Brotherhood terrestrial forces are not restricted by the UHAT, beyond specific provisions regarding cybernetics. The latter is a formality, as both Nod and GDI observe restrictions on cybernetic augmentations due to the Firestorm Crisis, in which an out-of-control AI seized vast numbers of Nod cyborg troops and turned them against both factions._

_Although neither GDI nor the Brotherhood are signatories of the Citadel Conventions, both sides do recognize and observe many of their restrictions, and recent amendments to the UHAT match the WMD limitations of the Conventions._


End file.
